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LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA. 


Class 


THE  STORY  OF  THE   GREAT  LAKES 


THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

NEW  YORK    •    BOSTON   •    CHICAGO 
ATLANTA  •    SAN  FRANCISCO 

MACMILLAN  &  CO.,  LIMITED 

LONDON  •    BOMBAY   •    CALCUTTA 
MELBOURNE 

THE  MACMILLAN  CO.  OF  CANADA,  LTD. 

TORONTO 


THE    STORY    OF    THE 
GREAT   LAKES 


BY 

EDWARD    CHANNING 

M 
PROFESSOR    OF    HISTORY    IN    HARVARD    UNIVERSITY 

AND 

MARION   FLORENCE    LANSING 

EDITOR     OF    THE     "OPEN    ROAD    LIBRARY*' 


WITH  MAPS  AND  ILLUSTRATIONS 

UNIVERSITY 

OF 


ff  otfc 
THE    MACMILLAN   COMPANY 

1909 

All  rights  reserved 


vi  Preface 

and  noble  deeds  should  be  treasured,  as  should 
the  achievements  of  the  builders  of  cities  and 
captains  and  soldiers  of  industry  of  our  own 
day. 

CAMBRIDGE,  MASSACHUSETTS, 
November,   1908. 


CONTENTS 

PART   I 
DISCOVERY  AND  EXPLORATION 

CHAPTER  PACK 

I.  The  Great  Lakes 3 

II.  Champlain  on  the  Great  Lakes,  1615—1616,       .  10 

III.  The  Jesuit  Mission  to  the  Hurons,  1626-1650.  25 

IV.  The  Pageant  of  Saint  Lusson,  1671             .          .  39 
V.  The  Building  of  the  Griffon,  1678-1679  .          .  49 

VI.      La  Salle  on  the  Great  Lakes,  1679  .          •          •        61 
VII.      A  Hapless  French  Governor,  1682-1684  .        73 

PART   II 
THE  STRUGGLE  FOR  POSSESSION 

VIII.  The  Founding  of  Detroit,  1701        .          .  .87 

IX.  Niagara  and  the  Loss  of  Canada,  1759      •  •      Io1 

X.  The  Conspiracy  of  Pontiac,  1763—1764   .  .      113 

XI.  The  Adventures  of  a  Trader,   1761  —  1764  .      135 

XII.  Wayne's  Indian  Campaign,  1794  .          .  .151 

XIII.  The  Great  Lakes  in  the  War  of  1812        .  .      165 

XIV.  The  Conquest  of  Lake  Erie,  1 8 1 3    .          .  .179 
XV.  General  Lewis  Cass  and  Reorganization,    1813- 

1832 191 

XVI.      The  Black  Hawk  War,  1832  .          .          .201 


Vlll 


Contents 


PART   III 

OCCUPATION  AND  DEVELOPMENT 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

XVII.  Gateways  of  the  Great  Lakes,  1600—1900      .      217 

XVIII.  The  Story  of  a  Road,  1600-1900         .          .228 

XIX.  Before  and  after  the  Turnpike,  1796—1811     .      242 

XX.  The  Erie  Canal,  1825        .          .          .          .251 

XXI.  The  Great  Lakes  in  1 840  .          .          .          .      266 

XXII.  The   Coming   of  the  Railroad  to  Lake  Erie, 

1836-1853 283 

XXIII.  Lincoln  and  Douglas  in  Chicago,  1858—1861      299 

XXIV.  The  Great  Lakes  in  the  Civil  War,  1864       .      317 
XXV.  Three  Great  Industries  of  the  Lakes       .          .      330 

XXVI.      Shipping  on  the  Lakes         .          .          .  356 

XXVII.     The  Development  of  the  City       .          .          -374 

A  BRIEF  LIST  OF  BOOKS  .          .          .          .          .          -385 
INDEX 393 


MAPS   AND    ILLUSTRATIONS 

MAPS 


PAGE 


Huron  —  Erie  —  Ontario           ....  1 2 

From  Lake  Michigan  to  the  Mississippi         .          .  .202 

Gateways  of  the  Lakes      .          .          .          .  .  .22* 

By  Trail  and  Turnpike  to  Lake  Erie   .          .  .  .232 

By  Canal  and  Railroad  to  Lake  Erie   .          .  .  .284 

ILLUSTRATIONS 

LaSalle Frontispiece 

The  "Soo"  Canal          ....  facing  page         8 

Niagara  Falls  as  sketched  by  Hennepin          .  ,,  52 

La  Barre  and  Grangula     .          .          .          .  „  76 

A  View  of  Niagara  Fort  .          .           .          .  „  104 

Black  Hawk „  2O4 

Through  the  Locks  at  Lockport           .  „  256 

Chicago  in  1831 „  278 

An  Early  Lake  Superior  Copper  Mine          .  „  348 

Iron  Ore  at  a  Lake  Superior  Port         .          .  „  352 
The  Old  and  the  New,  General  Cass's  Canoe 

and  a  Modern  Freight  Steamer    .          .  „  360 

Grain  Elevator  and  Lumber  Jam           .  „  370 

ix 


PART   I 
DISCOVERY  AND   EXPLORATION 


CHAPTER  I 

THE    GREAT    LAKES  . 

STANDING  in  Lake  Park,  Chicago,  beside 
the  statue  of  General  Logan,  the  supporter 
of  Douglas  and,  later,  of  Lincoln,  one  has 
behind  him  the  most  marvellous  city  of  modern 
times,  and  before  him  the  southwesternmost  of 
the  Great  Lakes.  In  front,  glitter  the  waters 
over  which  La  Salle  journeyed  three  centuries 
ago.  As  in  those  days,  they  respond  to  the  play 
of  wind  and  weather,  now  calm  as  a  sheet  of  glass, 
and  now  swept  by  sudden  gales  into  turbulent 
waves  and  breakers ;  but  the  aspect  of  the  land 
is  such  that  were  La  Salle  to  visit  it  he  would  not 
recognize  the  spot*  In  place  of  a  wilderness  with 
an  occasional  group  of  low-lying  Indian  wigwams 
he  would  see  a  mighty  city  of  buildings  towering 
one  hundred  and  fifty  feet  above  the  street  and 
reaching  down  from  twenty-five  to  fifty  feet  below 
ground.  In  place  of  a  few  canoes  with  their  loads 
of  furs  and  crews  of  savages,  emerging  from  the 

3 


4  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

narrow  mouth  of  the  Chicago  River,  seven  thou- 
sand freighters  and  steamers  with  an  aggregate 
tonnage  greater  than  that  floated  in  any  other 
port  in  the  world  touch  annually  at  the  wharves 
along  her  splendid  harbor  front.  These  vessels 
and  thousands  of  trains,  running  on  tracks  whose 
mileage  is  more  than  a  third  of  that  of  the  whole 
railway  system  of  the  United  States,  bring  to  her 
stockyards,  her  grain  elevators,  and  her  markets 
the  herds  and  flocks  of  the  western  plains,  the 
crops  of  the  wheat-fields  of  the  Northwest,  and 
the  merchandise  of  Europe  and  of  Asia. 

Chicago  is  the  greatest  distributing  centre  of 
this  region,  but  the  ports  of  Lake  Erie  handle 
many  important  industries  whose  traffic  never 
enters  Lake  Michigan.  The  copper  of  the  upper 
Michigan  peninsula,  the  iron  ore  of  the  Wiscon- 
sin and  Minnesota  ranges,  the  coal  of  Ohio  and 
Pennsylvania,  and  many  a  minor  industry  have 
had  their  share  in  building  up  the  modern  empire 
of  the  Great  Lakes.  The  body  of  water  about 
which  this  empire  has  risen  is  made  up  of  five 
lakes:  Superior,  Huron,  Michigan,  Erie,  and 
Ontario,  which  together  form  the  greatest  inland 
waterway  of  the  world.  These  lakes  have  an  area 
of  more  than  half  that  of  the  Black  Sea  or  the 


The  Great  Lakes  5 

Caspian,  while  Lake  Superior  is  the  largest  body 
of  fresh  water  on  the  globe.  The  four  upper 
lakes  are  so  nearly  level  that  one  canal  with  a 
single  lock  has  given  them  a  navigable  length 
of  over  fourteen  hundred  miles.  Lake  Ontario, 
however,  is  effectively  separated  from  the  others 
by  Niagara  Falls  and  its  attendant  rapids.  Other 
great  inland  bodies  of  water  are  directly  connected 
with  the  ocean  by  navigable  straits.  The  Medi- 
terranean Sea, is  entered  from  the  Atlantic  by  the 
Strait  of  Gibraltar,  the  Black  Sea  is  connected  in 
its  turn  with  the  Mediterranean  by  the  Darda- 
nelles and  the  Bosphorus ;  but  Niagara  closes 
direct  navigation  between  the  Great  Lakes  and 
the  sea. 

Canals  have  done  much  in  the  last  hundred 
years  to  alleviate  the  natural  inaccessibility  of 
the  lake  system.  Eighty-five  years  ago  the  Erie 
Canal  gave  a  water  route  from  the  eastern  end  of 
Lake  Erie  to  the  Hudson  River  and  thus  to  the 
Atlantic  Ocean.  Five  years  later  the  Welland 
Canal  passed  round  Niagara  Falls  and  connected 
Lake  Erie  with  Lake  Ontario,  and  a  third  canal 
soon  connected  Lake  Erie  with  the  Ohio  River. 
To-day  a  second  era  of  canal  building  is  upon  us. 
The  Welland  Canal  has  been  widened,  making  it 


6  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

possible  for  boats  of  moderate  draught  to  go  from 
Lake  Erie  to  Lake  Ontario  and  thence  by  nu- 
merous small  cuts  around  the  rapids  of  the  St. 
Lawrence  to  the  Atlantic.  The  Erie  Canal  is 
being  enlarged,  and  engineers  dream  of  a  time 
when  it  will  be  made  sufficiently  wide  and  deep 
for  sea-going  vessels  to  pass  from  the  Atlantic 
Ocean  to  Lake  Erie.  The  Hennepin  Canal  at 
Chicago  will  open  a  route  from  Lake  Michigan 
by  the  Illinois  and  Mississippi  rivers  into  the 
Gulf  of  Mexico.  Each  state  bordering  on  the 
Great  Lakes  as  well  as  every  province  of  the 
Dominion  of  Canada  is  to-day  planning  extensions 
of  this  canal  system. 

On  the  lonely  shores  past  which  La  Salle  and 
later  explorers  voyaged  have  been  built  villages, 
towns,  and  cities.  This  region  is  to-day  the  clear- 
ing-house of  the  commerce  of  the  central  plain  of 
North  America.  From  the  western  terminals  of 
the  lake  routes  railways  pass  over  the  plains  and 
mountains  of  the  Northwest  to  the  Pacific ;  from 
their  eastern  ports  stretch  lines  to  the  seaboard 
cities  of  the  Atlantic.  The  farms  of  the  North- 
west send  yearly  one  hundred  and  fifty  million 
bushels  of  wheat,  six  hundred  million  bushels  of 
oats,  and  a  billion  bushels  of  corn  to  Chicago  and 


The  Great  Lakes  7 

Buffalo  and  thence  to  the  eastern  states  and 
Europe.  Coming  from  the  west,  the  transconti- 
nental roads  pay  tribute  at  Chicago  and  then 
choose  between  the  route  north  of  Lake  Erie  via 
Detroit,  or  south  via  Cleveland.  They  unite  at 
Buffalo  and  follow  the  Mohawk  Valley  to  the 
Hudson  and  then  to  New  York  or  Boston;  or 
they  pass  the  Alleghanies  farther  south  and  reach 
the  coast  at  Philadelphia,  Baltimore,  or  Norfolk. 
In  any  case,  by  land  or  water,  from  the  north  or 
from  the  west,  these  products  come  to  the  Great 
Lakes,  and  are  carried  from  their  ports  to  the  fac- 
tories and  markets  of  the  East,  or  to  steamers 
bound  for  Europe.  This  combination  of  land 
and  water  transportation  makes  the  Great  Lakes 
the  keystone  of  American  industry. 

We  have  spoken  of  the  four  upper  lakes  as 
united  commercially  into  one  great  sea.  Before 
Lake  Superior  could  be  entered  from  the  others 
one  formidable  obstacle  had  to  be  overcome. 
Between  Lake  Superior  and  Lake  Huron  was  a 
ledge  of  rocks  half  a  mile  long  over  which  the 
waters  ran  in  swirling  rapids,  forming  the  Sault 
(or  Rapids  of)  Ste.  Marie.  At  this  point  the 
famous  "  Soo  "  Canal  has  been  constructed  with 
a  single  lock  which  is  the  largest  and  costliest  in 


8  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

the  world,  though  it  will  soon  be  surpassed  by 
those  at  the  entrance  of  the  Panama  Canal.  This 
canal  was  built  in  1855,  when  the  presence  of  iron 
and  copper  deposits  in  Michigan,  Wisconsin, 
and  Minnesota  was  first  discovered.  To-day  the 
tonnage  passing  yearly  through  it  runs  up  into 
figures  that  are  almost  beyond  belief;  but  these 
figures  form  the  best  single  index  of  the  traffic  of 
the  Great  Lakes.  In  the  seven  open  months  of 
1907  there  passed  through  the  "  Soo  "  one  hun- 
dred million  tons  of  freight  valued  at  four 
hundred  and  fifty  million  dollars.  This  tonnage 
is  nine  times  that  of  the  Suez  Canal.  The  mines 
whose  discovery  made  necessary  the  cutting  of 
the  "  Soo "  Canal  supply  a  large  part  of  this 
freight.  Of  iron  ore  alone  they  send  thirty-three 
million  tons  to  the  foundries  and  furnaces  of 
Pittsburg  and  other  centres,  where  the  raw  ma- 
terial is  manufactured  into  articles  of  iron  and 
steel  which  form  the  basis  of  modern  civilized 
existence.  From  the  deposits  of  the  upper  Mich- 
igan peninsula  comes  yearly  one-seventh  of  the 
world's  supply  of  copper. 

These  figures  give  some  idea  of  the  importance 
of  the  Great  Lakes  in  the  economic  development 
of  the  United  States.  Three  hundred  years  have 


The  Great  Lakes  9 

seen  this  region  converted  from  a  wilderness 
peopled  by  Indian  tribes  to  the  uses  of  modern 
civilization.  This  time  might  well  be  shortened, 
since  at  the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth  century 
the  Great  Lakes  and  bordering  lands  were  still 
occupied  by  the  red  man  and  a  few  small  villages 
and  trading  stations  of  the  whites.  It  is  indeed 
wonderful  what  changes  a  century  has  wit- 
nessed. 


CHAPTER    II 

CHAMPLAIN    ON    THE    GREAT    LAKES 

ON  the  28th  of  July,  1615,  Samuel  de 
Champlain  paddled  out  of  the  mouth 
of  the  French  River  into  the  waters 
of  Georgian  Bay,  an  arm  of  Lake  Huron ;  or, 
as  he  named  it  from  its  great  expanse,  the 
"Mer  Douce,"  or  "Freshwater  Sea/'  With 
him  was  a  young  interpreter,  Etienne  Brule,  who 
had  been  sent  by  Champlain  when  a  mere  lad  to 
winter  in  the  Huron  country,  and  to  learn  from 
the  Indians  their  languages  and  customs.  As  a 
member  of  this  Huron  party,  in  1610,  he  had 
been  the  first  white  man  to  look  upon  the  waters 
of  Lake  Huron,  the  central  of  the  five  Great 
Lakes.  Now  Champlain  himself  had  come, 
journeying  from  Montreal  with  a  trading  party 
of  Indians.  Some  of  the  Indians  had  slipped 
away  before  the  rest  of  the  expedition  was  ready, 
taking  with  them  a  missionary.  Father  Joseph 
Le  Caron  had,  therefore,  made  the  journey  a  few 

10 


Champlain  on  the  Great  Lakes  II 

days  before  his  leader,  but  at  last  Champlain  had 
reached  the  marvellous  sea  of  Indian  story,  and 
was  on  the  point  of  exploring  the  region  of  the 
Great  Lakes. 

He  found  the  lands  bordering  the  lakes  occu- 
pied by  three  groups  of  Indians :  the  Iroquois, 
who  were  closely  banded  together  into  a  league 
known  as  the  Five  Nations ;  the  Hurons,  who 
were  related  to  them,  but  were  always  at  war  with 
them ;  and  the  Algonquins,  who  belonged  to  one 
great  family,  but  were  now  divided  into  many 
widely  scattered  and  independent  tribes. 

The  Five  Nations  of  the  Iroquois  were  joined 
in  a  loose  but  effective  confederacy.  Originally 
they  had  formed  one  great  tribe,  but  internal 
dissension  had  split  them  into  five,  —  the  Mo- 
hawks, Oneidas,  Onondagas,  Cayugas,  and  Sene- 
cas.  Legend  states  that  Hiawatha  had  counselled 
union  and  had  thus  brought  about  the  League 
of  the  Iroquois,  which  was  the  most  important 
Indian  organization  north  of  Mexico.  The  con- 
federation was  governed  by  fifty  sachems,  ten 
from  each  nation,  who  made  up  a  grand  council. 
Unanimity  was  required  in  all  decisions,  but 
when  these  were  once  arrived  at  the  tribes  were 
obedient.  The  Iroquois  lived  in  a  wide  strip 


12  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

of  country  extending  from  Lake  Erie  and  Lake 
Ontario  eastward  across  central  New  York. 
They  called  this  section  of  country  "  The  Long 
House "  from  its  resemblance  in  shape  to  one 
of  their  oblong  dwellings. 


The  Algonquins  occupied  the  greater  part  of 
the  country  from  the  St.  Lawrence  to  Lake 
Superior  and  the  Mississippi,  and  included  the 
Illinois,  Wisconsin,  Chippewa,  Ottawa,  and  other 
tribes  of  the  lake  region.  In  the  centre  of  the 
Algonquin  country,  in  a  narrow  district  extend- 
ing eastward  from  Georgian  Bay  toward  Lake 
Ontario,  lived  the  Huron  nation,  a  strong  and 
prosperous  tribe.  Between  them  and  the  Iro- 
quois  there  was  constant  enmity,  and  for  a  time 


Champlain  on  the  Great  Lakes  13 

after  the  coming  of  the  whites  it  was  by  no  means 
certain  which  group  of  Indians  would  come  out 
victorious.  It  was  while  this  contest  was  at  its 
height  that  Samuel  de  Champlain  came  to  the  St. 
Lawrence  and  in  1608  founded  Quebec.  It  was 
to  the  Huron  settlements  he  was  journeying  in 
the  summer  of  1615. 

Champlain  was  born  in  southern  France  and 
had  already  won  fame  as  an  explorer.  He  had 
visited  the  West  Indies,  Mexico,  and  Central 
America,  and  had  suggested  the  building  of  a 
ship  canal  at  Panama.  He  had  coasted  the 
shores  of  New  England  and  had  been  one  of  the 
first  French  colonists  at  the  Bay  of  Fundy. 
After  the  founding  of  Quebec  he  had  traversed 
the  lake  which  now  bears  his  name  and  had  jour- 
neyed far  and  wide  in  the  surrounding  region. 
In  these  expeditions  he  had  allied  himself  with 
the  Indians  of  the  St.  Lawrence  and  had  sup- 
ported them  in  their  battles  with  the  Iroquois. 

In  the  summer  of  1615,  yielding  to  the  clamors 
of  the  Hurons  gathered  at  Montreal  for  their 
yearly  traffic  with  the  French,  Champlain  agreed 
to  accompany  them  on  an  inroad  into  the  Iro- 
quois country.  He  departed  for  Quebec  to 
make  needful  preparations,  but  when  he  returned 


14  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

after  a  delay  of  a  few  days  he  found  that  the 
impatient  Indians  had  set  out  for  their  villages, 
taking  with  them  Father  Joseph  Le  Caron,  a 
Recollect  friar  who  had  come  out  with  him  from 
France  that  spring  as  a  missionary  to  the  Indians. 
Champlain  embarked  immediately  with  ten  na- 
tives, Brule,  and  another  Frenchman  on  the 
journey  to  the  Huron  villages.  He  approached 
Lake  Huron  by  the  hard  northern  route,  travel- 
ling up  the  Ottawa  River,  along  the  portage  path 
to  Lake  Nipissing,  across  which  he  sailed,  and 
down  the  French  River.  Indian  tribes  along  the 
way  encouraged  the  voyagers,  telling  them  that 
the  Lake  of  the  Hurons  was  at  hand.  At  length 
they  came  out  from  between  the  banks  of  the 
river  into  the  waters  of  the  lake.  For  more  than 
a  hundred  miles  they  coasted  southward  along 
its  eastern  shores,  working  their  way  in  and  out 
among  countless  islands,  till  they  reached  the 
lower  end  of  Georgian  Bay.  There  they  landed 
and  proceeded  by  a  well-beaten  trail  into  the 
heart  of  the  Huron  country. 

From  the  moment  when  he  entered  the  first 
Huron  village  Champlain  recognized  that  this 
was  an  Indian  community  different  from  any 
that  he  had  heretofore  seen.  He  had  come  upon 


Champlain  on  the  Great  Lakes  15 

one  of  the  most  remarkable  savage  settlements 
on  the  continent.  The  people  lived  in  perma- 
nent villages  protected  by  palisades  of  crossed 
and  intersecting  trunks  of  trees.  Not  only  was 
the  land  naturally  fertile,  but  in  the  clearings 
between  the  stretches  of  heavy  forests  were  cul- 
tivated fields  of  maize  and  pumpkins,  and  gay 
patches  of  sunflowers  from  the  seeds  of  which  the 
the  Indians  made  oil  for  their  hair.  To  Cham- 
plain  coming  from  the  roving  Algonquins  of  the 
St.  Lawrence  and  the  barren  country  along  the 
Ottawa,  where  the  Indian  population  lived  by 
hunting  and  fishing,  the  social  advancement  of 
this  group  of  tribes  seemed  very  great. 

The  Hurons  welcomed  him  with  eager  hospi- 
tality and  took  him  from  village  to  village,  enter- 
taining him  with  lavish  feasting  and  celebration, 
for  he  was  the  champion  who  was  to  lead  them 
to  victory  against  their  hated  foe  the  Iroquois. 
At  the  principal  Huron  village  Carhagouha,  a 
settlement  of  two  hundred  bark  lodges  enclosed 
in  a  palisade  thirty-five  feet  high,  Champlain 
found  Father  Le  Caron. 

The  priest  had  feared  that  his  leader  would 
not  follow  the  Hurons,  or  that  if  he  did  he 
would  be  captured  by  the  Iroquois.  When  he 


1 6  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

looked  up  one  morning  and  saw  Champlain 
standing  in  the  doorway  of  his  dwelling  his  joy 
knew  no  bounds.  He  showed  him  the  bark 
wigwam  which  the  Indians,  to  prove  the  joy 
that  they  felt  at  his  coming,  were  building  for 
him.  They  had  offered  at  first  to  lodge  him  in 
one  of  their  common'  cabins,  but  Father  Le 
Caron  had  remonstrated  with  them,  representing 
that  "  to  negotiate  with  God  affairs  so  important, 
involving  the  salvation  of  their  whole  nation," 
he  needed  a  place  where  he  could  be  alone,  far 
from  the  tumult  of  their  families.  So  they  had 
brought  poles  and  bark  and  erected .  this  lodge 
at  the  edge  of  the  forest.  Here  he  had  raised 
an  altar,  and  here  on  the  I2th  of  August  was 
celebrated  the  first  mass  ever  held  in  the  country 
of  the  Hurons.  Curious  Indians  crowded  about 
as  the  priest  stood  before  his  rude  altar  and  led 
the  devotions  of  the  kneeling  band  of  Frenchmen 
with  Champlain  at  their  head.  For  the  first  time 
the  solemn  chant  of  the  "  Te  Deum  Laudamus  " 
rang  out  on  the  listening  air,  and  a  volley  of 
muskets  proclaimed  the  planting  of  a  cross  out- 
side the  priest's  lodge.  The  symbol  of  Christian- 
ity had  been  raised  in  the  country  of  the  heathen ! 
Before  they  set  out  on  the  war-path  the  Huron 


Champlain  on  the  Great  Lakes  17 

chiefs  insisted  on  a  weary  succession  of  feastings 
and  dancings,  rejoicing  in  their  serene  conviction 
of  victory  to  come.  Champlain  spent  the  time 
going  from  village  to  village,  gratifying  his  insati- 
able curiosity  over  everything  which  he  saw.  At 
last  the  savage  war-party  was  ready  to  set  out. 
They  crossed  Lake  Simcoe  and  paddled,  making 
the  necessary  portages,  down  the  chain  of  inter- 
vening lakes  to  the  river  Trent,  which  flowed 
into  Lake  Ontario.  The  country  through  which 
the  long  line  of  canoes  passed  was  singularly 
beautiful.  Champlain  found  it  hard  to  believe 
that  the  groves  of  walnut  trees,  whose  branches 
were  twined  with  hanging  grapevines,  had  not 
been  set  out  by  the  hand  of  man  to  form  a  beau- 
tiful artistic  picture.  The  party  stopped  once 
and  encamped  for  a  grand  deer-hunt,  and  then 
proceeded  on  its  way,  well-stocked  with  provi- 
sions for  the  first  days  in  the  enemies'  country. 
Out  upon  Lake  Ontario  the  frail  canoes  ventured, 
and  crossed  it  in  safety,  landing  on  the  eastern 
side  of  the  lake,  thirty  miles  or  so  from  Oswego. 
Now  a  change  came  over  the  warriors.  Si- 
lently they  hid  their  canoes  in  the  woods,  and 
with  stealthy  and  rapid  steps  they  filed  in  silence 
through  the  borders  of  this  hostile  country.  For 


1 8  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

four  days  they  marched  inland  through  the  for- 
est, crossing  the  Oneida  River  at  the  western  end 
of  the  lake,  and  on  the  9th  of  October  some  of 
their  scouts  brought  in  a  captured  fishing  party 
of  eleven  Iroquois,  men,  women,  and  children. 
A  Huron  chief  took  possession  of  the  prisoners 
and  began  to  torture  them,  cutting  off  a  finger 
of  one  of  the  women.  Champlain  met  this 
method  of  celebration  with  angry  protest,  declar- 
ing that  it  was  not  the  act  of  a  warrior  to  treat 
helpless  women  with  cruelty.  The  chief  agreed, 
since  it  was  displeasing  to  Champlain,  to  do 
nothing  more  to  the  women,  but  added  that  he 
would  do  to  the  men  what  he  pleased.  It  was 
a  curious  position  in  which  Champlain  had  placed 
himself,  aiding  one  group  of  savages  against 
another,  nor  did  he  find  it  to  his  liking. 

The  next  day  the  war-party  came  out  into  a 
clearing  in  the  forest,  from  which  they  could  see 
the  Iroquois  fort.  A  number  of  Iroquois  were 
gathering  corn  and  pumpkins  in  the  adjoining 
fields.  With  a  rush  the  impetuous  young  Hurons 
who  were  in  advance  screamed  their  war-cry  and 
fell  upon  them.  The  Iroquois  seized  their  arms 
and  defended  themselves  with  such  success  that 
their  assailants  began  to  fall  back.  Only  the 


Champlain  on   the  Great  Lakes  19 

timely  aid  of  Champlain  and  the  Frenchmen  with 
their  terrifying  muskets  saved  the  invaders  from 
defeat. 

Champlain  saw  that  this  irregular  way  of  fight- 
ing, each  person  according  to  his  whim,  would 
result  in  utter  ruin.  The  Hurons  withdrew  into 
the  forest  to  encamp  for  the  night,  and  there 
he  addressed  them  angrily,  showing  them  their 
foolishness  and  instructing  them  in  the  best 
methods  of  war.  He  found  the  Iroquois  village 
to  be  far  more  strongly  defended  than  any  that 
he  had  seen  among  the  Indians.  Four  rows  of 
palisades,  made  of  trees  thirty  feet  high,  sup- 
ported a  kind  of  gallery,  which  was  provided 
with  wooden  gutters  for  quenching  fire  and  piled 
high  with  a  goodly  supply  of  stones  to  hurl  at  the 
enemy.  This  was  a  stronghold  that  could  not 
be  captured  by  the  haphazard  methods  of  the 
Hurons.  Champlain  set  the  Indians  to  work  the 
next  morning  building  a  wooden  tower,  high 
enough  to  overlook  the  palisades  and  large 
enough  to  shelter  four  or  five  marksmen.  In 
four  hours  the  work  was  done,  and  two  hundred 
of  the  strongest  warriors  dragged  it  forward  to  a 
position  from  which  the  musketeers  could  pour  a 
deadly  fire  into  the  crowded  galleries.  The  rank 


2O  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

and  file  of  the  Hurons  were  meanwhile  equipped 
with  huge  wooden  shields  to  protect  themselves 
against  the  arrows  and  stones  of  the  enemy.  As 
the  deadly  bullets  fell  among  them  the  Iroquois 
rushed  headlong  from  the  gallery,  and  the  result 
of  the  battle  would  have  been  very  different  had 
the  Hurons  followed  out  Champlain's  well-con- 
ceived plans  ;  but  they  were  ungovernable.  With 
reckless  fury  they  threw  away  their  shields,  and 
yelling  their  war-cry  so  shrilly  that  no  command 
could  be  heard,  they  poured  out  into  the  open 
field,  discharging  their  own  arrows  but  exposing 
themselves  meanwhile  to  a  rain  of  stones  and 
arrows  from  the  Iroquois.  One  Huron,  bolder 
than  the  rest,  ran  forward  with  firebrands  to  burn 
the  palisade,  and  others  followed  him  with  the 
dry  wood  which  they  had  gathered  for  the 
purpose.  But  they  set  the  fire  on  the  leeward 
side  of  the  fort,  where  the  wind  was  against  it, 
and  torrents  of  water  poured  down  from  above 
soon  put  it  out.  In  vain  Champlain  shouted 
commands  and  made  every  effort  to  restore 
order.  He  soon  decided  that  his  shouting  would 
only  "  burst  his  own  head "  and  have  no  effect 
on  any  one  else.  So  he  and  his  Frenchmen  set 
to  work  picking  the  Iroquois  off  the  rampart 


Champlain  on  the  Great  Lakes  21 

with  their  shots.     After  three  hours  of  this  kind 
of  righting  the  Hurons  fell  back. 

Only  eighteen  men  had  been  wounded,  but 
among  them  were  two  chiefs  and  Champlain 
himself.  He  had  received  one  arrow  in  the  knee 
and  another  in  the  leg.  He  urged  the  Indians 
to  renew  the  attack,  but  they  refused.  From 
extreme  overconfidence  the  warriors  had  passed 
to  the  deepest  discouragement.  The  next  day 
a  violent  wind  offered  them  an  opportunity  to 
set  fire  to  the  fort,  but  the  Hurons  sat  silent  in 
their  camp.  For  five  days  they  waited  to  see 
if  the  five  hundred  allies  which  Brule  and  twelve 
Hurons  had  started  a  month  ago  to  fetch  would 
appear.  During  this  time  they  ventured  out 
occasionally  for  imprudent  skirmishes,  each  time 
running  back  under  the  cover  of  the  French 
musket  fire,  amid  taunts  from  the  Iroquois  on 
the  palisade  that  the  Hurons  had  very  little 
courage  to  require  French  assistance.  Then 
they  hastily  began  to  retreat,  carrying  their 
wounded  in  the  centre,  while  the  Iroquois  har- 
assed the  flanks  and  rear  of  the  company.  The 
wounded,  Champlain  among  them,  were  packed 
in  rude  baskets  made  on  the  spot,  and  bound 
on  the  backs  of  stout  warriors.  Champlain  gives 


22  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

a  vivid  picture  of  the  suffering  he  endured,  while 
he  was  thus  "bundled  in  a  heap,  and  doubled 
and  strapped  together  in  such  a  fashion  that  it 
was  as  impossible  to  move  as  for  an  infant  in 
swaddling-clothes."  The  torment  from  the 
cramped  position  and  constant  jolting  was  so 
much  worse  than  even  the  pain  of  his  wound 
that  as  soon  as  he  could  possibly  bear  his  weight 
on  his  leg  he  got  out  of  "  this  prison." 

Snow  and  hail  overtook  the  party  on  their 
dismal  march  to  the  lake.  They  were  relieved 
to  find  their  hidden  canoes  safe,  and  embarked 
once  more  on  Lake  Ontario.  In  his  vain  efforts 
to  get  the  Indians  to  renew  the  attack  after  their 
first  defeat,  Champlain  had  come  to  see  that  he 
had  lost  some  of  his  peculiar  influence  over  them. 
They  had  fancied  that  his  presence  would  ensure 
victory.  Now  they  saw  him  wounded,  and  by 
Indian  weapons.  Their  superstitious  reverence 
for  the  "man  with  the  iron  breast"  was  weakened. 
Here  on  the  shores  of  Lake  Ontario  he  was  to 
experience  a  very  practical  consequence  of  his 
loss  of  prestige.  The  Hurons  had  promised  him 
an  escort  to  Quebec ;  but  each  warrior  found  a 
reason  why  he  should  not  be  able  to  lend  his 
canoe  for  the  journey.  The  chiefs  who  had  made 


Champlain  on  the  Great  Lakes  23 

the  promises  had  little  control  over  their  men, 
and  Champlain  found  that  he  must  winter  with 
the  natives.  The  great  war-party  broke  up. 
Some  went  to  hunt  deer  and  bears,  others  to 
trap  beavers,  others  to  fish  in  the  frozen  lakes 
and  streams,  and  still  others  returned  to  their 
villages.  One  of  the  chiefs  offered  Champlain 
the  shelter  of  his  cabin,  which  he  was  glad  to 
accept,  and  he  settled  down  to  get  what  com- 
fort and  information  he  could  from  his  forced 
visit. 

Fifty  pages  of  Champlain's  minute  and  won- 
derfully illustrated  account  testify  to  the  fact  that 
he  was  not  idle  during  the  winter  months.  He 
records  many  interesting  customs  of  his  Indian 
hosts.  He  watched  their  deer- hunts,  visited  their 
villages  and  those  of  neighboring  tribes,  was 
umpire  in  their  disputes,  and  at  last  turned  his 
face  homeward  in  the  early  spring.  With  him 
went  Darontal,  his  Huron  host.  At  Quebec 
Champlain  was  welcomed  as  one  risen  from  the 
dead,  for  the  Indians  had  long  since  brought  in 
word  that  he  had  been  killed.  A  solemn  service 
was  held,  and  all  united  in  rendering  thanks  to 
God  for  protecting  the  travellers  in  their  many 
perils  and  dangers.  Upon  this  service  and  the 


24  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

various  acts  of  welcome  Darontal  gazed  in  be- 
wildered astonishment.  Champlain  showed  him 
all  the  marvellous  details  of  civilization.  With 
the  usual  Indian  stolidity  he  observed  everything 
carefully  and  calmly ;  but  at  last  his  wonder 
broke  down  his  reserve.  Before  he  departed  he 
told  Champlain  that  he  should  never  die  con- 
tented until  he  had  told  his  friends  of  the  French 
way  of  living  and  seen  them  adopt  it.  With 
valuable  presents  and  a  warm  invitation  to  come 
again  with  some  of  his  friends,  Darontal  paddled 
back  to  his  lodge  in  the  woods  with  a  story  that 
must  have  taken  months  in  the  telling. 

This  was  Champlain's  last  long  trip  of  explora- 
tion. For  the  remaining  years  of  his  life  the 
needs  of  the  colony  at  Quebec  held  him  fast. 
His  writings,  sold  in  the  book-stalls  of  France, 
inspired  others  to  cross  the  seas  and  to  continue 
the  exploration  and  settlement  of  the  wilderness. 


CHAPTER   III 

THE   JESUIT    MISSION    TO    THE    HURONS 

FROM  1615,  when  Father  Joseph  Le  Caron 
celebrated  the  first  mass  among  the  Hu- 
rons,  for  fourteen  years  a  few  intrepid 
priests  braved  the  difficulties  of  savage  life,  and 
endeavored  at  various  times  to  set  up  missions  in 
the  populous  Huron  villages  south  of  Georgian 
Bay.  They  suffered  almost  incredible  hardships, 
and  in  1629  Jean  Brebeuf  was  the  only  one  who 
was  left  in  the  region.  He  was  recalled  to 
Quebec,  but  five  years  later,  a  year  before  Cham- 
plain's  death,  he  set  out  with  two  Jesuit  compan- 
ions to  found,  in  the  villages  where  Champlain 
had  wintered  eighteen  years  before,  the  greatest 
Jesuit  mission  in  the  history  of  New  France. 

No  man  in  the  annals  of  Church  history  has 
shown  greater  personal  heroism  than  Father  Jean 
Brebeuf.  He  was  tall  and  strong,  well  fitted  to 
withstand  the  hardships  of  his  chosen  calling  and 
to  impress  the  Indians  with  his  power.  The 

25 


26  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

square  cap  and  surplice  which  he  donned  when 
he  assembled  them  for  instruction,  in  order,  as 
he  naively  writes,  to  "  give  more  majesty  "  to  his 
appearance,  were  never  less  needed.  With  natu- 
ral dignity  he  combined  the  power  of  a  life  con- 
secrated with  the  utmost  fervor  to  God  and  his 
Church.  Never  during  long  years  of  service  did 
he  waver  in  his  devotion  nor  shrink  from  any- 
thing that  lay  before  him  in  his  work.  From 
his  reports  sent  home  to  his  superiors  it  is  evi- 
dent that  he  made  a  deep  impression  on  the 
Indians.  In  these  detailed  accounts  of  his  ex- 
periences and  of  the  savages  among  whom  he 
worked  we  get  a  clear  idea  of  the  man.  We  see 
him  on  the  long  canoe  journeys,  sharing  in  the 
labor  of  paddling  and  portages,  till  even  he,  who 
already  knew,  as  he  says,  "  a  little  what  it  is  to 
be  fatigued,"  was  so  weary  that  his  body  could 
do  no  more.  But  he  tells  us  how  at  these  very 
times  his  soul  experienced  a  deep  peace  such  as 
it  had  never  known  before.  In  the  most  matter- 
of-fact  way  he  accepts  and  records  the  continual 
hardships,  never  complaining  of  his  lot,  but  writ- 
ing with  rare  modesty  because  his  whole  atten- 
tion is  centred  on  the  work  instead  of  on  himself. 
From  his  vivid  pictures  we  learn,  however,  the 


The  Jesuit  Mission  to  the  Hurons     •  27 

truth  of  one  of  his  casual  statements.  "  Truly," 
he  says,  "  to  come  here  much  strength  and  pa- 
tience are  needed  ;  and  he  who  thinks  of  coming 
here  for  any  other  than  God  will  have  made  a 
sad  mistake." 

In  1634  Father  Brebeuf  and  his  companions 
started  on  the  northern  journey  by  the  Ottawa 
River  and  Lake  Nipissing  to  the  Huron  country. 
They  accompanied  a  party  of  Hurons  who  were 
returning  from  their  annual  summer  trading  visit 
to  Quebec.  This  nine-hundred-mile  trip  took 
thirty  days.  Brebeuf  kept  count  and  found  that 
they  carried  their  canoes  thirty-five  times  on 
portages  one,  two,  and  even  three  leagues  long, 
covering  the  distance  three  and  four  times  to 
transport  even  their  small  amount  of  baggage, 
and  that  they  dragged  the  canoes  through  rapids 
at  least  fifty  times,  plunging  into  the  icy  water 
and  cutting  their  feet  on  the  rocky  bottom.  At 
night  they  slept  on  the  bare  earth  or  on  hard 
rocks,  stung  by  clouds  of  mosquitoes.  Their 
only  food  was  a  small  portion  of  Indian  corn 
coarsely  broken  between  two  stones,  which, 
though  better  than  fasting,  was  regarded  by  the 
Jesuits  as  "  no  great  treat."  Yet,  denying  them- 
selves the  ordinary  necessaries  of  life,  these  priests 


28  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

transported  the  precious  vessels  for  the  mass  over 
all  this  weary  way. 

The  other  Jesuits  suffered  even  more  than 
Brebeuf.  Their  goods  were  stolen ;  they  were 
separated  from  the  rest  of  the  Huron  party, 
and  deserted  midway  in  the  journey.  It  was 
weeks  before  the  worn-out  travellers  rejoined 
their  superior  in  the  Huron  village.  After  a  few 
experiences  like  this  in  reaching  the  mission  these 
wise  priests  composed  a  set  of  instructions  to  the 
brethren  who  should  follow  them  on  this  Ottawa 
route.  This  code  of  behavior  is  highly  charac- 
teristic of  the  methods  of  the  French  Jesuits. 
In  every  detail,  —  from  not  keeping  the  Indians 
waiting  when  they  were  ready  to  embark  and  not 
asking  too  many  questions,  to  being  careful  that 
in  the  canoe  the  brim  of  the  priest's  hat  did  not 
annoy  those  who  sat  nearest  him,  —  these  Jesuit 
fathers  aimed  "  not  to  be  troublesome,  even  to  a 
single  Indian,"  and  to  "love  them  like  brothers 
with  whom  you  are  to  spend  the  rest  of  your 
life."  In  this  spirit  lay  the  success  of  all  French 
effort  among  these  savage  peoples. 

At  length  Brebeuf  landed  on  the  southern 
shores  of  Georgian  Bay,  only  to  be  deserted  at 
the  last  moment  by  his  Huron  guides  and  left 


The  Jesuit  Mission  to  the  Hurons       29 

standing  in  the  midst  of  his  baggage  on  the  lonely 
shore.  He  knew  the  place  well,  for  he  had  lived 
three  years  in  a  neighboring  village.  This  settle- 
ment had,  however,  been  destroyed  and  its  in- 
habitants had  built  their  huts  on  another  spot 
several  miles  away.  Brebeuf  hid  his  goods  in 
the  woods  and  set  out  alone  by  one  of  the  gloomy 
forest  paths,  which  brought  him,  to  his  great 
relief,  to  the  new  village.  At  sight  of  him  some 
one  cried  out,  "  Why,  there  is  Echom  come 
again,"  and  at  once  every  one  ran  out  to  salute 
and  welcome  him,  calling,  "  What,  Echom,  my 
nephew,  my  brother,  my  cousin,  hast  thou  then 
come  again  ?  "  His  goods  were  fetched  from  the 
shore,  and  Brebeuf  was  established  in  the  house 
of  a  leading  chief.  As  soon  as  his  brother  priests 
had  arrived  the  Indians  set  about  building  a  house 
for  the  Jesuits.  Bad  crops  and  famine  had 
afflicted  the  people  of  late,  and  they  rejoiced 
doubly  at  the  coming  of  Brebeuf,  feeling  sure 
that  now  the  crops  would  no  longer  fail.  They 
wished,  therefore,  to  provide  for  his  staying  in 
their  village  instead  of  that  of  their  neighbors. 

The  house  which  the  missionaries  had  built 
for  them  was  a  constant  wonder  to  the  Indians. 
It  was  thirty-six  feet  long  and  twenty  wide,  and 


30  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

looked  from  the  outside  like  any  Huron  bark 
house.  But  within,  the  "  black-robes  "  had  made 
innovations  which  were  the  marvel  of  all  their 
visitors.  They  divided  the  house  into  three 
apartments,  separated  by  wooden  doors  such  as 
the  natives  had  never  seen.  The  first  room 
served  as  antechamber  and  storm  door  to  keep 
out  the  cold.  The  second  was  that  in  which 
they  lived.  It  was  at  once  kitchen,  carpenter 
shop,  place  for  grinding  wheat,  dining  room,  par- 
lor, and  bedroom.  Beneath  high  wooden  plat- 
forms, on  which  they  placed  their  chests  of 
goods,  the  missionaries  slept  on  sheets  of  bark 
or  beds  of  boughs  covered  with  rush  mats,  with 
skins  and  their  clothing  for  covering.  The  third 
part  was  their  little  chapel  where  they  set  up  their 
altar,  pictures,  and  sacred  vessels,  and  celebrated 
mass  every  day. 

The  house  itself  attracted  scores  of  visitors, 
but  when  the  clock  and  the  mill  were  set  going 
the  astonishment  of  the  Indians  knew  no  bounds. 
No  guest  came  who  did  not  beg  to  be  allowed  to 
turn  the  mill,  and  as  for  the  clock,  they  sat  in 
expectant  silence  by  the  hour,  waiting  for  it  to 
strike.  They  all  thought  it  some  living  thing, 
and  when  it  began  to  strike  they  would  look 


The  Jesuit  Mission  to  the  Hurons       31 

about  to  make  sure  that  all  the  "black-robes" 
were  there  and  that  no  one  was  hidden  to  shake 
it.  They  named  it  "  Captain  of  the  Day,"  and 
inquired  for  it  as  they  would  for  a  person,  wish- 
ing to  know  what  its  food  was  and  how  many 
times  it  had  spoken  that  day.  The  first  time 
they  heard  it  they  asked  what  it  said,  and  the 
clever  Jesuits  told  them  two  things.  "When  he 
strikes  twelve  times,  he  says,  cCome,  put  on  the 
kettle/'  This  speech  they  remembered  particu- 
larly well,  for  their  own  scanty  meals  were  usu- 
ally in  the  morning  and  evening,  and  they  were 
very  glad  during  the  day  to  take  a  share  of  the 
Fathers'  repast.  "  But  when  he  strikes  four  times, 
he  says,  c  Go  out,  go  away,  that  we  may  close  the 
door/"  the  Jesuits  told  their  guests,  and  imme- 
diately they  rose  and  went  out,  leaving  the  weary 
Fathers  free  from  the  constant  noise  and  chatter. 
The  missionaries  gathered  the  Indians  for  in- 
struction on  every  possible  occasion,  teaching  the 
children  their  prayers  in  Huron  rhymes  and 
preaching  and  explaining  the  faith  to  their  elders. 
The  converts,  save  those  baptized  on  the  point 
of  death  or  in  some  fear  of  deadly  peril,  were  few, 
but  the  worthy  Fathers  persisted  and  won  the 
gratitude  of  the  people  by  their  help  in  time  of 


32  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

famine  and  their  kindly  ministrations  to  the  sick. 
Other  Jesuits  joined  them  and  founded  additional 
missions  in  neighboring  villages.  The  Indians 
never  understood  these  mysterious  white  men,  but 
regarded  them  with  superstition,  holding  them 
answerable  for  bad  weather,  famine,  and  the  like, 
and  on  the  other  hand  honoring  them  when  all 
was  prosperous.  The  medicine  men  and  sorcer- 
ers were  constantly  against  them,  and  in  1637 
Father  Isaac  Jogues,  one  of  the  leading  Jesuits, 
heard  the  rumor  that  the  white  men  were  reported 
to  have  bewitched  the  nation  and  must  therefore 
be  cut  off.  The  assembly  of  Huron  chiefs  met, 
and  the  Jesuit  fathers  addressed  them  as  usual  on 
their  unfailing  topic,  the  joys  of  heaven  and  the 
fires  of  hell,  the  latter  being  always  the  only  part 
of  the  instruction  that  seemed  to  make  any  im- 
pression on  the  stolid  audience.  For  the  time 
being  the  Fathers  escaped  ;  but  they  were  still  in 
great  peril.  Brebeuf  wrote  a  letter  of  farewell  to 
his  superior  at  Quebec,  and  no  Jesuit  left  the 
house  without  the  expectation  of  having  a  toma- 
hawk crash  into  his  head  before  he  returned. 
The  unflinching  courage  of  the  Fathers  won  the 
Indian  respect.  The  Jesuits  even  went  so  far  as 
to  give,  according  to  the  usual  Indian  custom  for 


The  Jesuit  Mission  to  the  Hurons       33 

one  on  the  point  of  death,  a  farewell  feast  to  all 
the  savages,  an  act  which  was  regarded  as  a  dec- 
laration that  they  knew  their  peril  and  faced  it 
boldly.  From  that  time  forth  their  supporters 
rose  in  defence  of  them.  For  the  moment  the 
danger  was  averted  and  the  Jesuits  walked  abroad 
once  more.  From  now  on,  however,  their  per- 
secution as  sorcerers  continued  at  intervals  in 
different  places,  rising  now  and  then  to  a  storm 
of  superstitious  frenzy. 

During  the  next  five  years  the  Jesuits  extended 
their  missions  among  the  Hurons  till  almost 
every  town  had  resident  priests.  They  established 
on  the  shores  of  the  river  Wye  a  central  station, 
which  by  1648  had  grown  into  a  prosperous  com- 
munity with  buildings  which  would  accommodate 
sixty  persons.  Pioneers  went  out  to  neighboring 
nations.  Brebeuf  and  a  companion  journeyed  to 
the  Neutral  Nation  which  lived  north  of  Lake 
Erie  and  west  and  south  of  Lake  Ontario,  but 
were  met  with  strong  opposition  stirred  up  by  the 
superstitious  Hurons,  who  conceived  that  it  would 
be  an  easy  and  safe  method  of  getting  rid  of  the 
priests  to  have  their  neighbors  kill  them.  The 
two  escaped  after  great  hardship  and  danger. 
Isaac  Jogues  and  Charles  Gamier  went  with  at- 


34  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

tendants  to  the  Tobacco  Nation,  which  lived  two 
days'  journey  distant  to  the  southwest,  but  were 
as  rudely  repulsed.  Jogues  was  a  young  man  of 
indomitable  will  to  whom  hard  tasks  seem  always 
to  have  been  assigned  because  of  his  complete 
self-surrender  and  consequent  power.  To  him 
fell,  nevertheless,  in  the  autumn  of  1641  the 
pleasant  duty  of  visiting  a  tribe  in  the  far  west 
who  had  invited  the  priests  to  come  to  them.  At 
Lake  Nipissing  in  September  the  Jesuits  met 
certain  savages  called  Ojibways,  who  urged  the 
"black-gowns"  to  visit  them  in  their  homes,  and 
gave  directions  for  the  journey.  In  accordance 
with  this  invitation  Jogues  and  Raymbault,  with 
a  small  Huron  escort,  set  sail  on  Lake  Huron 
and  after  a  voyage  of  seventeen  days  reached  the 
rapids  where  dwelt  their  friends  at  the  location  of 
the  modern  Sault  Ste.  Marie.  Here  they  found 
about  two  thousand  savages  who  welcomed  them 
cordially  and  looked  and  listened  with  awe  as  the 
priests  celebrated  mass  and  explained  their  doc- 
trines. They  invited  the  Fathers  to  take  up 
their  abode  with  them,  saying  that  they  would 
"embrace  them  like  brothers  and  profit  by  their 
words,"  but  the  Jesuits  could  not  be  spared  from 
their  other  work.  Jogues  listened  with  interest 


The  Jesuit  Mission  to  the  Hurons       35 

to  tales  of  a  great  lake  beyond  the  Sault,  which  it 
took  nine  days  to  cross,  and  of  a  great  river  be- 
yond, where  dwelt  mighty  nations,  "who,"  the 
Fathers  reported  to  Paris,  "have  never  known 
Europeans  or  heard  of  God."  They  could  not 
stay,  but  sailed  away,  naming  the  place  of  their 
sojourn  Ste.  Marie  after  the  mission  from  which 
they  came.  They  were  not  the  first  white  men 
to  visit  this  strait.  Nicolet,  a  voyager  and  trader, 
had  travelled  with  Brebeuf  in  1634  as  far  as  the 
Huron  mission  and  had  then  pushed  on  alone  to 
the  foot  of  these  rapids  and  thence  along  the 
shores  of  Lake  Michigan,  greeted  everywhere  by 
crowds  of  wondering  savages.  It  was  left,  how- 
ever, to  these  pioneer  missionaries  to  give  to  this 
important  waterway  the  name  which  it  still  bears. 
Jogues  returned  to  the  Huron  mission  and 
wintered  there,  starting  in  the  spring  of  1642  for 
Quebec  with  the  Huron  traders  to  bring  supplies 
to  the  mission,  which  was  in  a  state  of  destitution. 
As  he  was  returning  up  the  St.  Lawrence  River 
he  and  his  companion,  Goupil,  were  captured  by 
the  Iroquois,  who  led  them  to  the  Mohawk  towns. 
There  most  of  the  Hurons  of  the  party  were 
killed,  and  Jogues  and  his  white  companion  were 
tortured  and  terribly  mutilated.  Goupil  lost  his 


36  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

life  in  the  Iroquois  camp,  but  Jogues  was  finally 
rescued  by  Dutch  allies  of  the  Mohawks  and  sent 
to  Europe.  From  there  he  returned  to  New 
France  and  was  tortured  and  killed  by  the  Iro- 
quois in  1646. 

Isaac  Jogues  was  the  first  Jesuit  to  fall  in  the 
progress  of  that  warfare  which  was  to  bring  to  a 
tragic  end  the  Jesuit  mission  to  the  Hurons  by 
wiping  out  the  towns  in  which  the  missionaries 
labored.  The  journey  from  Quebec  to  the 
Huron  country  was  now  fraught  with  peril  from 
the  marauding  bands  of  Iroquois  warriors.  Two 
years  after  the  first  capture  of  Jogues  an  expedi- 
tion led  by  Brebeuf  relieved  the  needs  of  the 
missionaries  by  bringing  supplies.  That  same 
year  another  Jesuit  on  his  way  to  the  mission 
was  taken  by  the  Iroquois,  but  in  1645  a  tempo- 
rary peace  rekindled  the  hopes  of  the  Fathers. 
Three  years  later  the  warfare  broke  out  with 
renewed  fury,  and  it  soon  became  evident  that 
the  Huron  nation  was  doomed.  Large  bands  of 
Hurons,  deserting  their  towns,  fled  into  the 
interior.  The  Jesuits  aided  those  who  remained 
to  defend  their  homes,  but  town  after  town  was 
taken  and  one  after  another  Jesuit  fell  into  the 
hands  of  the  Iroquois  and  suffered  martyrdom 


The  Jesuit  Mission  to  the  Hurons       37 

with  cruel  tortures.  The  story  of  the  tragic 
death  of  Jean  Brebeuf,  the  founder  of  the  mission, 
is  one  of  wonderful  strength  and  endurance  amid 
most  revolting  tortures.  The  few  remaining 
Jesuits  withdrew  with  the  terrified  Indian  surviv- 
ors to  an  island  in  Lake  Huron,  which  they  were 
able  for  a  time  to  defend,  but  the  Iroquois  lay  in 
an  ambuscade  and  captured  the  fugitives  when- 
ever they  went  ashore.  At  the  earnest  entreaty 
of  the  chiefs  of  the  doomed  nation  the  Jesuits 
gathered  the  remnant  of  their  people  and  aban- 
doned with  them  the  desolated  country  which 
had  been  for  thirty-five  years  the  seat  of  mission- 
ary labors.  Sadly  they  proceeded  on  the  long 
journey  to  Quebec,  passing  everywhere  deserted 
villages  which  had  been  partially  destroyed  by 
fire.  Once  they  were  attacked  by  the  Iroquois, 
but  at  length  reached  Quebec  in  safety.  The 
Iroquois  had  driven  the  Hurons  from  their  homes 
to  perish  by  famine  and  pestilence  until  the  whole 
nation  was  practically  wiped  out,  and  the  most 
important  field  of  Jesuit  missions  was  turned  into 
a  solitude  and  a  desolation.  The  future  for 
French  missions  looked  dark  indeed,  and  for  a 
time  western  exploration  was  also  abandoned. 
Within  four  years  hope  of  better  success  in 


38  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

converting  the  heathen  appeared  in  an  unexpected 
spot.  The  crafty  Iroquois,  attacked  by  their 
southern  neighbors,  sent  overtures  of  peace  to 
Quebec  and  invited  to  their  villages  the  once 
hated  Jesuit  priests.  Father  Le  Moyne  was  the 
first  to  respond,  and  others  followed,  eager  to 
convert  this  savage  people.  The  first  mission 
was  brought  to  a  speedy  end  by  the  uprising  of 
the  Iroquois  against  the  remaining  Hurons  and 
their  former  white  allies  in  1658,  but  by  1665 
the  government  of  New  France  was  strong  enough 
to  mete  out  deserved  punishment  to  the  maraud- 
ing parties  of  Iroquois  warriors,  and  by  1668 
a  mission  was  established  in  each  of  the  Five 
Nations. 


CHAPTER   IV 

THE    PAGEANT    OF    SAINT    LUSSON 

WITH  the  destruction  of  the  Huron  mis- 
sions western  exploration  ceased  for  a 
few  years.  In  1660  Father  Menard 
passed  through  the  Sault  Ste.  Marie  and  spent  a 
winter  ministering  to  the  Indians  on  the  southern 
shore  of  Lake  Superior.  In  the  following 
summer  he  set  out  on  an  inland  journey  from  the 
lake  and  was  never  heard  from  again.  In  the 
same  year,  however,  two  fur-traders,  Radisson 
and  Groseilliers,  coasted  along  the  shore  of  Lake 
Superior  and  Lake  Michigan  and  were  followed 
by  many  Jesuit  missionaries  whose  names  have 
become  famous.  Two  principal  mission  stations 
were  established,  one  at  Sault  Ste.  Marie,  the 
other  at  La  Pointe  at  the  western  end  of  Lake 
Superior.  At  these  places  missionaries  and 
traders  heard  many  tales  of  a  great  river  to  the 
south  and  of  rich  copper  deposits  in  the  lake 
region,  which  in  turn  led  to  more  exploring  expe- 
ditions. 

39 


40  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

At  Sault  Ste.  Marie,  in  1671,  there  was  a  pic- 
turesque ceremony  when  Daumont  de  Saint  Lus- 
son, agent  of  Louis  XIV,  took  possession  of  the 
interior  of  North  America  in  the  name  of  his 
king.  For  months  the  French  and  the  Indians 
had  been  preparing  for  this  pageant.  Messages 
had  been  sent  to  all  the  Indian  tribes  living  within 
one  hundred  leagues  of  Ste.  Marie,  urging  them 
to  attend,  and  Nicholas  Perrot,  a  Canadian  voyager 
and  interpreter,  had  visited  many  of  the  tribes  in 
person  to  make  sure  of  their  coming.  With  a 
large  Indian  following,  he  paddled  up  the  Strait 
of  Mackinac  from  Lake  Michigan  and  landed  at 
the  foot  of  the  rapids.  Saint  Lusson  was  already 
there  with  fifteen  men.  The  French  leaders  were 
housed  at  the  mission  station,  while  the  savages 
made  themselves  comfortable  in  temporary  lodges 
erected  along  the  stretch  of  shore  and  in  the 
fields.  Gradually  tribe  after  tribe  from  the  north 
and  the  west  arrived,  and  on  the  I4th  of  June, 
when  fourteen  tribes  or  their  representatives  had 
come,  Saint  Lusson  announced  that  the  ceremony 
would  take  place. 

The  Frenchmen,  led  by  Saint  Lusson,  as- 
sembled in  the  village,  and  crowds  of  curious 
Indians  gathered  about  the  small  group  of  white 


The  Pageant  of  Saint  Lusson  41 

men.  The  French  soldiers  had  brought  out  their 
gayest  uniforms  and  had  polished  their  swords 
and  muskets  till  they  shone  in  the  sunlight. 
Coureurs  de  bois  —  runners  of  the  woods  — 
and  other  Indian  traders  stood  about  in 
their  rough  picturesque  costumes.  At  the  head 
of  the  line  walked  four  Jesuits  arrayed  in  the 
impressive  vestments  of  the  priesthood.  The 
names  of  these  four  men  stand  to-day  as  they 
signed  them  at  the  foot  of  the  instrument  which 
records  this  act  of  taking  possession.  They  were 
a  group  of  priests  noteworthy  in  the  history  of 
the  lakes.  At  one  end  stood  Father  Claude 
Dablon,  the  Superior  of  the  Missions  of  the 
Lakes ;  next  him  came  Gabriel  Druilletes,  a  vet- 
eran missionary,  whose  experience  with  the  Indians 
exceeded  probably  that  of  any  Frenchman  in 
Canada,  and  who  had  been  sent  by  the  govern- 
ment years  before  on  a  mission  to  the  English  colo- 
nists on  the  Atlantic  to  invite  their  cooperation 
against  the  Iroquois.  Father  Claude  Allouez  had 
followed  Father  Menard  in  the  Lake  Superior 
country  and  founded  the  La  Pointe  Mission,  and 
Father  Louis  Andre  was  establishing  a  station 
among  the  Ottawas  at  Manitoulin  Island. 
Father  Allouez  had  been  obliged  to  leave  the 


42  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

young  Jesuit  missionary  Marquette  in  charge  at 
La  Pointe.  Had  he  been  with  his  brother 
priests,  the  circle  of  famous  names  would  have 
been  complete. 

Led  by  these  four  men,  the  line  of  Frenchmen 
—  a  motley  company  of  soldiers,  priests,  explorers, 
and  traders  —  marched  up  the  hill  to  a  height 
which  had  been  selected  because  it  overlooked 
the  surrounding  country.  On  either  side  of  the 
column  and  behind  it  hovered  the  vast  throng 
of  dusky  Indians.  As  the  Frenchmen  halted  and 
grouped  themselves  about  a  huge  cross  of  wood 
that  lay  on  the  ground,  the  Indians  fell  into  posi- 
tion behind  them  and  stood  silent,  waiting  to  see 
what  the  "white  faces"  would  do.  When  all 
was  quiet,  Father  Dablon,  as  Superior  of  the  Lake 
Missions,  stepped  forward  and  blessed  the  cross 
with  all  the  ceremonies  of  the  Church.  At  a 
sign  from  Saint  Lusson  the  holy  wood  was  lifted, 
and  as  the  foot  of  the  standard  fell  into  the 
opening  prepared  for  it,  the  Frenchmen  sang 
with  all  their  hearts  the  ancient  hymn  of  their 
church :  — 

"  The  royal  banners  forward  go, 
The  Cross  shines  forth  in  mystic  glow: 
*  *  *  * 


The  Pageant  of  Saint  Lusson  43 

Fulfilled  is  all  that  David  told, 

In  true  prophetic  song  of  old; 

How  God  the  heathen's  King  should  be, 

For  God  is  reigning  from  the  tree." 

As  they  looked  from  the  mighty  cross  to  the 
horde  of  assembled  savages  the  Frenchmen  felt 
that  to-day  as  never  before  these  words  were  ful- 
filled. The  uncomprehending  Indians,  who 
gazed  at  the  pageant  with  wondering  delight  in 
its  pomp,  little  knew  how  the  minds  of  these 
white  men  were  filled  with  the  vision  of  a  time, 
of  which  this  was  the  forerunner,  when  these  red- 
skinned  savages  should  be  followers  of  the 
heavenly  King  of  the  French  and  the  obedient 
retainers  of  their  earthly  monarch. 

Beside  the  cross  was  erected  a  cedar  pole  to 
which  was  nailed  a  metal  plate  engraved  with  the 
royal  arms  of  France.  As  this  was  being  raised 
the  Frenchmen  chanted  the  twentieth  Psalm,  "In 
the  name  of  our  God  we  will  set  up  our  banners," 
and  one  of  the  Jesuits,  even  "  in  that  far-away 
corner  of  the  earth,"  as  the  record  says,  offered  a 
prayer  for  the  French  king  in  whose  name  all  this 
was  being  done.  Thus  side  by  side  the  stand- 
ards of  the  two  monarchs  were  raised  in  the  wil- 
derness, and  Saint  Lusson,  stepping  forward  amid 


44  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

an  expectant  hush,  with  a  sword  in  one  hand  and 
a  sod  of  earth  in  the  other,  took  formal  possession 
of  the  soil  with  these  words:  — 

"  In  the  name  of  the  most  high  and  redoubt- 
able sovereign,  Louis  the  Fourteenth,  Christian 
King  of  France  and  Navarre,  I  now  take  posses- 
sion of  all  these  lakes,  straits,  rivers,  islands,  and 
regions  lying  adjacent  thereto,  whether  as  yet 
visited  by  my  subjects  or  un visited,  in  all  their 
length  and  breadth,  stretching  to  the  sea  at  the 
north  and  at  the  west,  or  on  the  opposite  side  ex- 
tending to  the  South  Sea.  And  I  declare  to  all 
the  people  inhabiting  this  wide  country  that  they 
now  become  vassals  of  His  Majesty,  and  bound  to 
obey  his  laws  and  follow  his  customs.  He  will 
protect  them  against  all  enemies.  In  his  name  I 
declare  to  all  other  princes  and  sovereigns  and 
potentates  of  whatever  rank,  —  and  I  warn  their 
subjects,  —  that  they  are  denied  forever  seizing 
upon  or  settling  within  the  limits  set  by  these 
seas ;  except  it  be  the  pleasure  of  His  Most 
Christian  Majesty,  and  of  him  who  shall  govern 
in  his  behalf;  and  this  on  pain  of  incurring  his 
resentment  and  the  efforts  of  his  arms.  Long 
live  the  King!" 

As  the  last  words  fell  from  his  lips  the  French- 


The  Pageant  of  Saint  Lusson  45 

men  responded  with  a  loud  shout,  "  Vive  le  Roi ! 
Long  live  the  King !  "  ;  guns  were  fired,  and  the 
Indians  shouted  and  yelped  with  delight.  "The 
astonishment  and  delight  of  those  people,"  says 
the  chronicler,  knew  no  bounds,  "  for  they  had 
never  seen  anything  of  the  kind."  If  words  and 
the  planting  of  symbols  could  do  it,  the  king  of 
France  had  taken  possession  of  the  continent  of 
North  America,  extending  his  dominion  to  the 
shores  of  seas  of  which  he  had  no  knowledge. 
But  the  dream  of  the  French  was  not  fulfilled. 
To-day  a  rival  people,  which  then  occupied  only 
a  small  strip  of  the  Atlantic  seaboard,  has  swept 
away  almost  every  trace  of  the  empire  thus  pro- 
claimed. 

In  order  to  impress  upon  the  Indians  more 
clearly  the  meaning  of  this  august  ceremony, 
Father  Claude  Allouez  had  been  appointed  to  set 
forth  the  glory  of  the  monarch  to  whom  they 
were  that  day  submitting  themselves.  He  had 
spent  many  hours  listening  to  flowery  Indian 
harangues,  and  was  familiar  with  the  style  of 
speech  which  suited  their  comprehension  and  met 
with  their  approval.  What  the  Indians  gathered 
from  his  curious  address  we  do  not  know.  After 
reading  the  part  of  it  which  has  been  preserved 


46  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

we  cannot  wonder  that,  as  the  record  tells,  "they 
had  no  words  with  which  to  express  their 
thoughts.'* 

As  soon  as  the  wild  uproar  of  shouts  and  mus- 
ketry was  hushed  Father  Allouez  stepped  forward 
on  a  slight  eminence  and  began  his  speech.  With 
a  few  words  he  dismissed  the  usual  subject  of  his 
priestly  discourses,  the  cross  and  its  significance, 
and  turned  to  the  other  post  on  which,  as  he  ex- 
plained to  them,  were  fastened  the  armorial  bear- 
ings of  the  great  "  Captain  of  France."  To  him 
all  the  captains  whom  they  had  seen  were  mere 
children,  or  little  herbs  which  one  tramples  under- 
foot as  compared  to  a  great  tree.  Even  Onontio, 
—  the  governor  of  New  France,  —  whose  name 
was  a  daily  terror  to  that  mighty  nation,  the 
Iroquois,  was  but  one  of  ten  thousand  captains 
who  lived  beyond  the  seas.  When  this  great 
captain  said,  "  I  am  going  to  war,"  all  obeyed 
him.  Those  ten  thousand  captains  raised  com- 
panies of  a  hundred  warriors  each,  disposing  them 
according  to  his  orders,  on  sea  or  land.  Those 
who  were  needed  at  sea  embarked  on  great  ships 
which  held  four  or  five  hundred  or  even  a  thou- 
sand men,  while  their  Indian  canoes  held  only  four 
or  five,  or  at  best  ten  or  twelve.  Thus  did  this 


The  Pageant  of  Saint  Lusson  47 

king  with  his  vast  numbers  of  followers  prepare 
for  war,  and  when  he  came  to  attacking  the  enemy 
he  was  more  terrible  than  thunder,  and  the  earth 
trembled  beneath  him,  while  air  and  sea  were  set 
on  fire  by  the  discharge  of  his  cannon.  He  had 
been  seen  in  the  midst  of  his  warriors  covered 
with  the  blood  of  his  enemies  whom  he  killed  in 
such  numbers  that  he  set  flowing  rivers  of  blood. 
But  all  this  was  now  long  past.  No  one  dared 
to  make  war  on  him  ;  all  nations  had  submitted 
to  him  and  begged  humbly  for  peace. 

In  this  warlike  guise  Father  Allouez  presented 
Louis  XIV  till  the  Indian  admiration  was  fully 
aroused  and  all  were  "  astonished  to  hear  that 
there  was  any  man  on  earth  so  great  and  rich  and 
powerful." 

The  day  closed  with  a  "  fine  bonfire,"  lighted 
toward  evening,  around  which  the  Frenchmen 
sang  the  "  Te  Deum,"  thanking  God  on  behalf 
of  "  those  poor  peoples,"  who  did  not  know 
enough  to  do  it  for  themselves,  —  that  they  were 
the  subjects  of  so  great  and  powerful  a  monarch. 
The  Indians  departed  to  their  homes,  traders 
and  coureurs  de  bois  disappeared  into  the  forests, 
the  Jesuits  returned  to  their  self-sacrificing  life 
of  ministry,  and  adventurous  French  pioneers  set 


48  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

out  across  lake  and  wood  to  explore  and  claim 
the  vast  wilderness  thus  appropriated  by  France. 
The  pageant  of  Saint  Lusson  was  over,  and  Sault 
Ste.  Marie  relapsed  into  its  usual  life  ;  but  thus 
early  in  the  history  of  the  Great  Lakes  this  place 
had  been  singled  out  as  a  strategic  spot. 


CHAPTER   V 

THE    BUILDING    OF    THE    GRIFFON 

THE  next  noteworthy  event  in  the  story 
of  the  Great  Lakes  is  the  building  and 
the  launching  of  the  Griffon,  and  the 
voyage  of  La  Salle  from  the  Niagara  River  to 
the  southern  end  of  Lake  Michigan.  Robert 
Cavelier,  Sieur  de  la  Salle,  or  La  Salle  as  he  is 
usually  called,  came  to  Canada  in  1666,  when 
he  was  three  or  four  and  thirty  years  of  age. 
Outwardly  cold  and  reserved,  he  was  inwardly 
consumed  with  a  burning  desire  for  adventure. 
After  his  arrival,  he  set  to  work  to  study  the 
Indian  languages,  in  which  he  soon  became  pro- 
ficient ;  and  it  was  his  delight  to  invite  Indians  to 
his  cabin,  and  to  draw  from  them  tales  of  the  far- 
off  regions  in  which  they  dwelt,  and  especially  of 
those  wonderful  rivers,  the  Ohio  and  the  Missis- 
sippi, by  the  exploration  of  which  he  hoped  to 
provide  a  new  passage  to  China  and  Japan.  An 
exploring  trip  which  he  took  in  1669  gave  him 

E  49 


50  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

the  practical  experience  which  was  later  to  be  of 
value.  La  Salle  was  a  man  of  strong  prejudices 
and  personal  dislikes,  who  took  little  pains  to 
overcome  the  jealousy  of  those  who  were  envious 
of  him ;  but  he  gained  one  strong  friend  and 
patron,  Count  Frontenac,  the  governor  of  New 
France,  who  recognized  a  kindred  spirit  in  this 
bold,  enterprising  young  man. 

To  a  person  of  La  Salle' s  disposition,  the  lands 
to  the  south  of  the  Great  Lakes  offered  alluring 
prospects  of  immediate  gain.  Instead  of  the  bar- 
ren soil,  gloomy  forests,  and  harsh  climate  of  the 
lower  St.  Lawrence  Valley,  this  new  country  was 
largely  open  and  abundantly  supplied  with  mead- 
ows, brooks,  and  rivers.  The  soil  was  so  fertile 
that  everything  which  could  be  produced  in 
France  could  be  easily  raised,  and  there  was  an 
abundance  of  fish,  game,  and  venison.  Colonists 
would  find  it  easy  to  supply  their  own  needs,  and 
could  engage  in  profitable  cattle  raising,  for  flocks 
and  herds  could  be  left  out  all  winter.  La  Salle 
also  reported  that  there  was  a  species  of  native 
wild  cattle,  called  the  buffalo,  whose  wool  was 
better  than  that  of  any  sheep  in  France.  He 
sought  Louis  XIV,  king  of  France,  and  asked 
permission  to  found  colonies  and  to  conduct  the 


The  Building  of  the  Griffon  51 

fur  trade  and  explorations  on  the  regions  border- 
ing on  the  Great  Lakes.  The  French  king  did 
not  wish  to  found  new  colonies,  for  those  already 
in  existence  had  proved  very  expensive,  but  he 
was  willing  that  La  Salle  should  cc  labor  at  the 
discovery  of  the  western  parts  of  New  France," 
provided  that  he  pay  all  the  expenses  of  the 
enterprise  himself,  and  bring  the  matter  to  a 
conclusion  within  five  years.  With  this  permis- 
sion and  such  money  as  he  could  raise,  La  Salle 
returned  to  New  France,  and  in  the  autumn  of 
1678  set  out  to  put  his  plans  into  execution. 
Detailed  and  interesting  reports  of  his  voyage  on 
the  waters  of  the  Great  Lakes  have  been  preserved 
in  the  entertaining  account  of  the  journey  which 
was  written  by  Father  Louis  Hennepin,  an  adven- 
turous missionary  who  delighted  in  telling  stories 
about  himself  and  his  doings.  He  was  also  some- 
thing of  a  prophet  in  foreseeing  the  time  when 
there  would  be  an  "  inconceivable  commerce  "  on 
the  Great  Lakes,  and  their  shores  would  be  lined 
with  the  shops  and  dwellings  of  the  whites. 

Up  to  this  time  the  French  missionaries  and 
the  fur  traders  had  gained  the  interior  by  way  of 
the  Ottawa  River,  or  the  Toronto,  and  Georgian 
Bay.  La  Salle  decided  to  build  a  sailing-vessel 


52  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

on  the  shore  of  Lake  Erie,  in  which  he  could 
transport  his  men  to  the  stations  he  intended  to 
establish,  and  also  carry  his  trading  goods  to  the 
Indians,  and  bring  back  the  furs  which  he  obtained 
in  exchange  for  them.  He  already  had  a  fortified 
post  at  Fort  Frontenac  on  the  northeastern  shore 
of  Lake  Ontario  ;  but  he  could  not  build  his  ship 
at  this  point,  because  the  natives  told  him  that 
formidable  cataracts  interrupted  the  navigation 
between  Lakes  Ontario  and  Erie.  He  sent  an 
advance  company  to  establish  a  station  at  the 
head  of  Lake  Ontario,  and  to  seek  a  convenient 
site  on  Lake  Erie  for  the  construction  of  the  ship. 
With  this  expedition  went  Father  Hennepin, 
whose  graphic  account  of  what  he  saw  and  of 
what  he  experienced  is  one  of  the  most  interest- 
ing in  the  annals  of  American  exploration.  The 
voyagers  reached  the  mouth  of  the  Niagara  River 
in  safety.  When  the  current  became  too  strong 
for  them  to  go  farther  in  their  canoe,  they  landed 
and  pushed  forward  through  the  snow.  As  they 
made  their  way  along  the  edge  of  the  river,  they 
heard  more  and  more  clearly  the  roar  of  falling 
waters;  and,  at  length,  there  burst  upon  their 
sight  the  falls  of  Niagara,  or  the  "  Thunder  of 
Waters,"  as  the  Indians  called  it,  —  that  "vast 


-.    THE 

UNIVERSITY 

OF 

£*UFORH^ 


The  Building  of  the   Griffon  53 

and  prodigious  cadence  of  water  which  falls  down 
after  a  surprising  and  astonishing  manner,  inso- 
much that  the  universe  does  not  afford  its  parallel, 
those  of  Italy  and  Switzerland  being  but  sorry- 
patterns."  Hennepin  describes  this  wonderful 
cataract  as  made  up  of  two  great  cross-streams 
of  water  and  two  falls  with  an  island  between,  and 
declares  that  when  this  "  prodigious  quantity  "  of 
water  comes  to  fall,  there  is  a  din  and  a  noise 
more  deafening  than  the  loudest  thunder;  the 
rebound  of  the  waters  was  so  great  that  a  cloud 
arose  from  the  foam  and  hung  over  the  abyss, 
even  when  the  sun  was  at  its  height.  He  could 
not  say  enough  of  this  cc  most  beautiful,  and  at 
the  same  time  most  frightful  cascade  "  which  he 
saw  for  the  first  time  on  this  December  day  in 
I678.1 

While  Hennepin  and  his  party  were  exploring 
the  Niagara,  La  Motte,  the  leader  of  the  expedi- 

1  Lake  Ontario  is  326  ft.  lower  than  Lake  Erie  and  about  30  miles  distant. 
For  1 8  miles  the  Niagara  River  flows  peacefully  along,  then  suddenly  the  chan- 
nel narrows  and  the  waters  rush  down  5  3  ft.  in  half  a  mile,  and  then  drop  over 
a  cliff  1 60  ft.  in  two  separate  falls,  one  600  and  the  other  200  ft.  wide.  Seven 
thousand  tons  of  water  are  thus  discharged  every  second  into  a  narrow  gorge 
whose  nearly  perpendicular  walls  rise  200  ft.  on  either  side.  Down  its  steep 
slope  the  imprisoned  waters  dash  in  a  succession  of  boiling  rapids,  white  with 
foam,  forming  in  one  loop  of  the  channel  a  curious  whirlpool.  Issuing  from 
this  gorge  at  Lewiston,  the  river  flows  tranquilly  on  to  Lake  Ontario. 


54  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

tion,  had  selected  a  site  for  a  fortified  house  about 
two  leagues  above  the  mouth  of  the  river  and  not 
far  from  the  present  town  of  Lewiston.  He  set 
his  laborers  to  work,  but  their  task  was  hard,  be- 
cause the  frozen  ground  had  to  be  thawed  with 
boiling  water  before  it  was  possible  to  drive  down 
stakes  for  a  palisade.  As  the  carpenters  labored 
at  their  tasks,  distrustful  and  jealous  Indians  from 
a  neighboring  Seneca  village  of  the  Iroquois  loi- 
tered about,  watching  them  with  sullen  looks,  and 
intimated  in  a  way  that  could  not  be  disregarded 
their  unwillingness  to  allow  the  work  to  go  on. 
And  well  they  might !  Niagara  was  the  key  to 
the  four  upper  lakes  from  which  the  Iroquois  fur 
trade  could  be  controlled,  and  this  fort  was  being 
built  expressly  to  hold  in  check  those  vigorous 
tribes,  and  put  an  end  to  their  trade  with  the 
English  and  the  Dutch  in  the  furs  which  they 
obtained  from  the  Indians  of  the  western  terri- 
tory. La  Salle  had  realized  that  difficulty  would 
probably  arise,  and  had  instructed  La  Motte  to  go 
to  the  great  village  of  the  Senecas  and  endeavor  to 
gain  their  consent  to  the  French  plans  for  build- 
ing the  fort  and  the  ship.  This  La  Motte  now 
decided  to  do.  After  five  days'  journey  through 
the  snowy  forests,  he  and  his  companions  reached 


The  Building  of  the  Griffon  55 

the  town  which  was  beyond  the  Genesee  and 
southeast  of  Rochester,  not  far  from  the  present 
town  of  Victor,  New  York.  The  weary  travellers 
were  conducted  to  the  wigwam  of  the  principal 
chief,  where  women  and  children  flocked  to  gaze 
upon  the  whites.  An  old  man,  according  to  cus- 
tom, went  through  the  village  announcing  their 
arrival,  and  younger  savages  washed  their  feet 
and  then  rubbed  them  with  bear's  grease. 

The  next  afternoon,  La  Motte  was  summoned 
to  confer  with  forty-two  old  men  who  made  up 
the  Indian  council.  These  chiefs,  clad  in  robes 
of  beaver,  wolf,  or  black  squirrel,  squatted  upon 
the  ground  ;  but,  writes  Hennepin,  "  the  senators 
of  Venice  do  not  appear  with  a  graver  counte- 
nance and  perhaps  do  not  speak  with  more  maj- 
esty and  solidity  than  these  ancient  Iroquois." 
La  Motte's  interpreter  harangued  the  assembly, 
stating  that  the  French  wished  to  build  a  great 
wooden  canoe  and  to  erect  a  fort  on  the  banks 
of  the  Niagara  River.  He  endeavored  to  con- 
vince the  natives  that  this  enterprise  would  be  for 
their  advantage,  as  it  would  enable  the  French  to 
sell  them  goods  at  lower  prices  than  the  Dutch 
and  English  traders.  He  enforced  every  reason 
with  wampum  belts,  and  gifts  of  axes,  knives, 


56  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

coats,  and  scarlet  cloth,  —  for  the  best  arguments 
in  the  world  were  not  listened  to  by  the  Indians 
unless  accompanied  by  presents.  The  shrewd, 
savage  politicians  received  the  gifts,  but  were  not 
convinced.  Their  replies  were  general  and  eva- 
sive and  gave  no  satisfaction.  When  the  council 
was  over,  they  preceded  to  torture  an  Indian 
prisoner,  and  La  Motte  with  his  men  left  the 
camp  in  disgust  to  go  back  and  await  the  arrival 
of  La  Salle  from  Fort  Frontenac.  La  Salle  and 
Tonty,  his  ever  faithful  friend  and  follower,  with 
men  and  supplies  for  the  expedition  arrived  at 
the  Seneca  town  not  long  after  the  departure  of 
La  Motte  and  his  men.  La  Salle  succeeded  in 
"  so  dexterously  gaining  their  affection  "  that  the 
Indians  consented  to  permit  him  to  carry  arms 
and  ammunition  by  the  Niagara  portage,  to  build 
a  vessel  above  the  cataract,  and  to  establish  a 
fortified  warehouse  at  the  mouth  of  the  river. 
Armed  with  this  permission,  he  proceeded  to  the 
encampment  of  La  Motte.  The  rejoicing  at  this 
success  was  short  lived,  for  a  few  days  later  report 
came  that  a  vessel  which  La  Salle  had  left  at  the 
mouth  of  the  Genesee  River  had  been  ship- 
wrecked on  the  southern  shore  of  Lake  Ontario. 
Of  all  the  equipment  for  his  enterprise  with  which 


The  Building  of  the  Griffon  57 

this  vessel  was  laden,  only  the  anchors  and  cables 
for  the  new  ship  were  saved ;  but  La  Salle  with 
his  unvarying  fortitude  went  on  with  the  work 
as  if  nothing  had  happened. 

La  Salle  selected  a  spot  on  the  banks  of  the 
Niagara  River  above  the  falls  at  the  mouth  of 
what  is  now  called  Cayuga  Creek,  where  the  water 
was  quiet,  being  sheltered  by  an  island  from  the 
current  of  the  river  —  a  little  village  near  that 
spot  still  bears  his  name.  Hither  the  little  com- 
pany of  thirty  men,  heavily  laden  with  tools  and 
provisions,  journeyed  laboriously  through  the 
snow  on  one  of  the  last  days  of  January,  1679. 
Two  Mohegan  hunters,  who  were  with  the  party, 
set  about  making  bark  wigwams  for  the  men  and 
a  chapel  for  Father  Hennepin,  who  had  travelled 
the  twelve  miles  with  his  portable  altar  lashed 
to  his  back.  The  ship  carpenters  went  to  work 
at  once,  and  in  four  days  the  keel  of  the  vessel 
was  ready.  La  Salle  invited  Father  Hennepin 
to  drive  the  first  bolt,  "  but  the  modesty  of  my 
religious  profession,"  he  says,  "compelled  me  to 
decline  this  honor."  So  La  Salle  himself  drove 
the  first  nail  in  the  ship. 

Fortunately  the  majority  of  the  Iroquois  war- 
riors had  gone  on  the  war-path  beyond  Lake 


58  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

Erie;  but  although  those  who  had  remained  at 
home  were  less  insolent  because  of  the  absence 
of  the  rest,  yet  they  did  not  fail  to  visit  the  ship- 
yard frequently,  loitering  sullenly  about  and  ex- 
hibiting their  displeasure.  One  of  them,  pre- 
tending to  be  drunk,  attacked  the  blacksmith, 
and  tried  to  kill  him  ;  but  the  blacksmith  vigor- 
ously defended  himself  with  a  red-hot  bar  of  iron. 
This,  together  with  the  severity  of  the  reprimand 
administered  by  Father  Hennepin,  who  always 
represents  himself  as  indispensable  on  every  occa- 
sion, induced  the  savages  to  depart  for  the  mo- 
ment. The  work  went  rapidly  on,  and  as  the 
great  "  wooden  canoe  "  began  to  show  its  propor- 
tions the  Indians  became  more  and  more  alarmed. 
A  few  days  later  a  squaw  told  the  French  that 
they  meant  to  burn  the  vessel  on  the  stocks,  and 
had  not  a  very  close  watch  been  kept  they  would 
undoubtedly  have  done  so. 

These  frequent  alarms,  the  steady  cold,  and 
the  shortage  of  supplies  owing  to  the  loss  of  La 
Salle's  vessel  and  the  enmity  of  the  Iroquois, 
who  refused  to  sell  them  food,  discouraged  the 
shipbuilders.  They  would  certainly  have  de- 
serted had  not  La  Salle  and  Hennepin  taken 
great  pains  to  reassure  and  cheer  them  on. 


The  Building  of  the  Griffon  59 

Toward  spring  La  Salle  set  out  on  foot  for  Fort 
Frontenac  to  procure  food  and  supplies  and  to 
attend  to  his  personal  affairs.  His  presence  was 
needed  there  because  his  enemies  had  persuaded 
his  creditors  that  the  undertaking  was  a  rash  one, 
and  had  instigated  them  to  seize  all  his  goods, 
although  Fort  Frontenac  alone  was  more  than 
sufficient  to  pay  his  debts.  During  La  Salle's 
absence  from  Niagara  one  of  the  workmen  en- 
deavored to  stir  up  the  others  to  desert.  "  This 
bad  man,"  announces  Hennepin,  "would  infal- 
libly have  perverted  our  carpenters,  had  not  I 
confirmed  them  in  their  good  resolution  by  the 
exhortations  I  made  them  after  divine  service." 

The  Mohegan  hunters  brought  in  deer  and 
other  game,  warmer  weather  arrived,  and  cheer- 
fulness once  more  prevailed.  The  shipbuilders 
went  on  with  their  work  more  briskly,  and  in  the 
early  spring  of  1679,  before  La  Salle  returned, 
the  vessel  was  ready  to  be  launched.  Father 
Hennepin  blessed  the  ship  and  christened  it  the 
Griffon,  for  on  the  prow  La  Salle  had  placed  a 
roughly  carved  figure  of  this  mythical  monster, 
taken  from  the  coat  of  arms  of  Count  Frontenac. 
The  assembled  company  sang  a  hymn  of  praise  ; 
three  cannon  were  fired ;  and  amid  loud  acclama- 


60  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

tions  from  both  French  and  Indians,  the  Griffon 
glided  into  the  Niagara  River.  All  haste  had 
been  made  to  get  her  afloat,  even  before  she  was 
entirely  completed,  to  save  her  from  the  plots  of 
the  Indians,  who  were  determined  to  burn  her. 
But  the  men  did  not  wait  for  her  to  be  finished 
to  put  her  to  use.  They  immediately  quitted 
their  bark  wigwams,  swung  their  hammocks 
under  her  decks,  and  that  very  night,  rejoicing  in 
their  security  from  the  Indians,  all  slept  soundly 
on  board  the  ship. 

The  Iroquois  warriors,  returning  from  a  hunt- 
ing trip,  were  mightily  surprised  to  see  the  vessel 
afloat,  and  shouted,  "  Otkon  !  Otkon  !  "  which 
means  "  most  penetrating  wits,"  to  the  triumphant 
Frenchmen.  For  they  could  not  understand  how 
in  so  short  a  time  the  white  men  could  build 
so  large  a  canoe,  —  although  the  craft  was  of 
only  about  forty-five  tons.  With  her  five  cannon 
she  was  to  the  savages  a  wonderful  moving  for- 
tress, and  inspired  in  them  a  wholesome  fear  and 
admiration  for  the  French. 


CHAPTER   VI 

LA    SALLE    ON    THE    GREAT    LAKES 

IN  the  summer  of  1679,  La  Salle  returned 
from  Fort  Frontenac  to  Niagara  to  find  the 
Griffon  finished  and  ready  for  her  first 
voyage.  By  the  completion  of  this  vessel  his 
enterprise  was  fairly  launched.  Behind  him  at 
Montreal  were  enemies  and  creditors  ;  before 
him  stretched  the  waters  of  the  Great  Lakes,  and 
beyond  was  the  unexplored  wilderness.  The  men 
had  been  unable  to  sail  the  Griffon  up  the  Niagara 
River  to  the  mouth  of  Lake  Erie  because  of  the 
strong  adverse  current.  Now,  with  the  help  of 
a  strong  wind  and  with  tow-ropes  in  the  most 
difficult  places,  La  Salle  brought  the  vessel 
through  the  turbulent  water  to  the  calm  outlet  of 
the  lake.  There  the  crew  celebrated  their  safe 
passage  with  religious  services  and  cannonading 
and  then  set  sail  on  the  unknown  waters. 

To  deter  his  men  from  the  voyage,  La  Salle's 
enemies  had  declared  that  the  lake  was    full  of 

61 


62  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

rocks  and  sands.  For  the  first  day  and  night, 
therefore,  the  men  kept  their  sounding-lines  busy, 
but  navigation  proved  to  be  easy.  On  the  fourth 
day  after  leaving  Niagara,  they  reached  the  mouth 
of  that  wide  river  called  by  the  French  "The 
Strait,"  —  Detroit.  Here  the  current  was  so 
strong  that  they  came  to  anchor  to  wait  for  a 
favorable  breeze.  Soon  a  brisk  wind  arose 
and  the  Griffon  ploughed  her  way  through  the 
rapids  between  Grosse  Isle  and  the  mainland, 
pioneer  of  the  mighty  vessels  which  to-day  make 
that  strait  one  of  the  great  commercial  highways 
of  the  world.  On  both  sides  stretched  fine  open 
fields  dotted  with  fruit  trees,  and  walnut  and 
chestnut  groves,  and  beyond  in  the  distance  were 
lofty  forests.  All  were  "  so  well-disposed,"  says 
Hennepin,  "that  one  would  think  Nature  alone 
without  the  help  of  art  could  not  have  made  so 
charming  a  prospect."  Flocks  of  turkeys  and 
swans  circled  about,  and  from  the  deck  of  the 
ship  herds  of  deer  could  be  seen  roaming  the 
meadows.  The  Griffon  was  soon  well  stocked 
with  meat,  and  the  returning  hunters  united  in 
heaping  praises  on  this  beautiful  spot  where  fruit 
and  game  of  every  kind  abounded,  and  where 
even  the  bears  were  not  so  savage  as  in  other 


La  Salle  on  the  Great  Lakes  63 

places.  Hennepin  urged  La  Salle  to  make  a 
settlement  on  this  "charming  strait,"  but  La 
Salle  coldly  reminded  him  of  the  great  passion 
which  he  had  professed  a  few  months  before  for 
the  discovery  of  a  new  country,  and  the  priest 
was  silenced.  Amid  the  later  hardships  of  the 
journey  all  must  have  looked  longingly  back 
to  this  time  of  ease  and  plenty  at  the  strait  of 
Detroit. 

On  the  1 2th  of  August,  the  Griffon  passed 
by  the  site  of  the  present  city  of  Detroit.  Had 
they  come  here  ten  years  before,  the  explorers 
would  have  found  on  the  bank  of  the  river  a 
large  stone,  rudely  fashioned  in  the  likeness  of  a 
human  figure  and  bedaubed  with  paint,  which 
the  Indians  worshipped  as  a  manito,  or  god. 
But  in  1670  French  priests,  making  the  first 
recorded  passage  through  the  strait,  had  come 
upon  this  image,  and  "full  of  hatred  for  this 
false  deity,"  had  fallen  upon  it  with  their  axes, 
breaking  it  in  pieces  and  casting  it  into  the  water. 
Beyond  Detroit  the  river  widened  into  a  beau- 
tiful little  sheet  of  water.  As  it  was  St.  Claire's 
day,  Hennepin's  proposal  that  the  name  of  the 
founder  of  his  order  be  given  to  this  lake  was 
carried  out,  and  it  received  its  present  name. 


64  The  Story  of  the  Great   Lakes 

When  the  Griffon  had  crossed  the  lake,  the 
men  saw  before  them  wide  marshes  through  which 
the  swift-moving  river  had  many  a  winding  chan- 
nel. They  had  come  to  the  St.  Clair  Flats,  a 
fan-shaped  delta  of  seven  channels,  on  which  has 
been  built  to-day  a  popular  summer  resort.  They 
set  to  work  sounding  one  passage  after  another, 
only  to  find  them  shallow  and  almost  barred  with 
shoals.  But  at  last  they  came  upon  an  excellent 
channel  about  a  league  broad,  with  no  sands  and 
a  depth  everywhere  of  from  three  to  eight  fath- 
oms of  water  through  which  the  vessel  sailed 
easily  toward  Lake  Huron.  At  the  mouth  of 
the  river,  however,  they  were  forced  to  drop 
anchor  and  remain  for  several  days.  A  north 
wind  had  been  blowing,  driving  the  water  of  the 
three  upper  lakes  into  the  strait.  This  had  in- 
creased so  much  the  usual  force  of  the  current 
that  it  was  as  violent  as  that  of  the  Niagara,  and 
entirely  impassable  for  a  vessel  like  the  Griffon. 
Even  when  the  wind  turned  southerly,  La  Salle 
could  make  no  headway  against  this  current  until 
he  sent  ashore  a  dozen  men  who  hauled  and 
towed  the  vessel  along  the  beach  for  half  an 
hour,  dragging  her  out  of  the  narrow  mouth  of 
the  channel  into  the  wave-tossed  waters  of  the 


La  Salle  on  the  Great  Lakes  65 

lake.  Once  more  all  returned  "thanks  to  the 
Almighty  for  their  happy  navigation,"  and  set 
sail  on  the  2jd  of  August  on  Lake  Huron. 

The  favoring  winds  soon  died  down,  and  La 
Salle  lay  becalmed  for  two  days  among  the  is- 
lands of  Thunder  Bay.  Starting  from  there  at 
noon  on  his  way  northward,  he  was  caught  in  a 
furious  westerly  gale.  For  hours  the  little  vessel 
tossed  and  drifted  over  the  raging  waters  of  the 
lake,  lying  at  the  mercy  of  wind  and  wave. 
Even  La  Salle  gave  up  hope  and  told  his  men 
to  prepare  for  death.  All  fell  on  their  knees 
except  the  pilot,  who  devoted  the  time  instead 
to  cursing  and  swearing  against  his  employer  for 
having  brought  him  there  to  perish  in  a  "  nasty 
lake,  and  lose  the  glory  he  had  acquired  by  long 
and  happy  navigations  on  the  ocean."  But  Pilot 
Lucas  and  his  brave  commander  were  not  des- 
tined to  perish  in  that  storm.  Hennepin  vowed 
an  altar  to  St.  Anthony  of  Padua,  prudently 
agreeing  to  set  it  up  in  Louisiana  if  they  should 
reach  there.  The  storm-clouds  rolled  away,  the 
waters  grew  quiet,  and  the  sun  shone  out  on  the 
wooded  cliffs  of  the  islands  of  Bois  Blanc  and 
Mackinac,  and  the  dense  forests  of  Michigan. 
The  vessel  anchored  behind  the  point  of  St. 


66  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

Ignace,  in  the  harbor  of  Michilimackinac,  the 
settlement  which  was  at  once  the  centre  of  Jesuit 
missions  and  of  Indian  traders. 

The  sound  of  the  Griffon's  cannon  brought  out  a 
varied  throng  from  the  wigwams  and  cabins  on 
shore.  Shouting  Indians  gazed  with  wonder  at 
this  huge  wooden  canoe ;  lawless  French  traders, 
swarthy  from  long  years  in  the  wilderness,  to 
whom  the  distance  of  this  trading  post  from 
civilization  was  its  strongest  recommendation, 
lounged  idly  out  of  their  cabins,  gazing  with 
resentment  at  this  invader  of  their  trade  and 
country;  while  black-robed  Jesuit  priests  hurried 
to  the  shore  to  welcome  the  newcomers.  Indians, 
traders,  and  Jesuits  united  in  a  show  of  welcome 
to  La  Salle  as  he  landed,  finely  dressed  and 
wearing  a  scarlet  cloak  bordered  with  broad  gold 
lace.  All  marched  to  the  little  bark  chapel  in 
the  Ottawa  village,  and  united  with  the  voyagers 
in  hearing  mass  and  giving  thanks  for  their  safe 
passage. 

At  this  settlement  La  Salle  found  four  of  fifteen 
men  whom  he  had  sent  ahead  the  autumn  before 
to  buy  furs,  and  to  go  to  the  tribes  along  the 
Illinois  River,  making  preparations  for  his  com- 
ing. Most  of  these  men  had  been  enticed  from 


La  Salle  on  the  Great  Lakes  67 

his  service,  and  had  wasted  the  goods  given  them 
to  exchange  for  furs,  using  them  for  their  own 
personal  gain.  Troubled  over  his  affairs  in 
Canada  La  Salle  had  meant  to  return  from  this 
point  to  Montreal,  leaving  Tonty  to  conduct  his 
party  to  the  Illinois  River.  But  he  soon  felt  the 
hostile  spirit  at  the  trading  post,  and  realized 
that  his  presence  was  necessary  to  keep  his  men 
from  being  drawn  away.  Even  the  swarms  of 
Indians  who  hovered  in  their  canoes  about  the 
vessel  regarded  it  with  wonder  and  jealousy  rather 
than  friendliness,  and  La  Salle  feared  that  the 
Illinois  tribes  would  be  tampered  with  by  his 
enemies. 

He  determined  to  push  on  at  once,  and  em- 
barked early  in  September.  The  vessel  pro- 
ceeded across  Lake  Michigan,  called  by  the 
French  and  Indians  Lake  Illinois  from  the  name 
of  the  tribes  who  inhabited  its  southern  shores, 
and  cast  anchor  at  the  entrance  of  Green  Bay. 
Here  matters  took  a  turn  for  the  better.  As  the 
vessel  lay  tossing  about  behind  a  point  of  the 
bay,  an  Indian  chief  came  out  in  his  canoe  to 
greet  the  Frenchmen.  When  he  learned  that 
La  Salle  was  a  friend  of  Count  Frontenac  and 
bore  his  commission,  the  Indian  told  him  of  his 


68  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

own  warm  friendship  for  Frontenac,  for  whom  he 
would  gladly  lay  down  his  life,  and  welcomed  La 
Salle  with  the  greatest  cordiality.  He  reported, 
too,  the  presence  of  Frenchmen  near  by,  and  La 
Salle  found  the  faithful  remnant  of  his  advance 
party  waiting  with  a  cargo  of  furs  which  they  had  4 
collected.  Eager  to  satisfy  his  clamorous  credit- 
ors, he  determined  to  send  back  the  Griffon,  in 
charge  of  the  pilot  and  five  men,  with  this  load 
of  furs.  On  the  i8th  of  September,  the  Griffon 
fired  a  parting  shot  and  started  for  Niagara,  to 
return  as  soon  as  she  had  discharged  her 
cargo ;  and  La  Salle,  with  Hennepin  and  four- 
teen others,  embarked  in  four  canoes  for  the 
south. 

The  canoes  had  hardly  started  when  a  sudden 
September  storm  swept  across  the  lake.  The 
waves  washed  into  the  heavily  laden  canoes,  dark- 
ness fell,  and  it  was  only  by  constant  shouting 
that  the  men  kept  their  boats  together  and  got 
to  shore.  For  four  days  the  storm  raged  with 
unabated  fury.  As  La  Salle  and  his  men  waited 
from  day  to  day  in  their  cheerless  encampment, 
living  on  pumpkins  and  Indian  corn  presented 
them  by  the  friendly  Indian  chief  and  the  meat 
of  a  single  porcupine  brought  in  by  a  hunter,  the 


La  Salle  on  the  Great  Lakes  69 

thought  of  the  Griffon  haunted  them.  Their 
worst  fears  proved  afterward  to  have  been  ful- 
filled ;  she  was  never  heard  of  again.  With  her 
sank  the  cargo  which  was  to  have  restored  La 
Salle's  credit  in  Montreal;  and  with  her,  too, 
perished  the  high  hopes  that  had  been  set  upon 
this  first  vessel  on  the  upper  lakes. 

Although  La  Salle  feared  the  worst,  he  did 
not  turn  back.  As  soon  as  the  lake  grew  calm 
the  four  canoes  set  out  again,  coasting  southward 
along  the  shore  of  Wisconsin.  But  the  elements 
were  against  them.  Storm  after  storm  drove 
them  ashore,  where  they  spent  wretched  days  and 
nights  among  the  rocks  and  bushes,  crouched 
around  driftwood  fires  with  nothing  to  shelter 
them  from  snow  and  rain  but  their  blankets.  As 
they  went  southward,  steep,  high  bluffs  ran  so 
close  to  the  lake  that  it  was  hard  to  find  a 
landing-place.  Yet  the  violence  of  the  wind  was 
so  great  that  they  were  compelled  at  evening  to 
drag  their  canoes  to  the  top  of  the  bluffs  in  order 
not  to  leave  them  exposed  all  night  to  the  waves 
which  would  have  'dashed  them  to  pieces.  In 
the  morning,  in  order  to  reembark,  two  men  had 
to  go  into  the  water  to  the  waist  and  hold  a 
canoe  upright  until  it  was  loaded,  pushing  it  out 


yo  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

or  drawing  it  back  as  the  waves  advanced  or 
retreated.  Food  gave  out  and  the  men  paddled 
from  morning  till  night  with  nothing  to  eat  but 
a  daily  handful  of  Indian  corn  and  hawthorn  ber- 
ries which  they  picked  on  shore  and  devoured 
so  ravenously  that  they  made  them  ill.  Exhaus- 
tion and  famine  stared  them  in  the  face,  but  relief 
was  in  sight. 

One  morning  as  the  men  were  paddling  along 
near  the  site  of  Milwaukee,  they  saw  upon  the 
shore  a  cloud  of  ravens  and  eagles  hovering  over 
something.  They  hastened  on  land  and  found 
the  body  of  a  deer  which  had  been  killed  by  a 
wolf.  This  was  the  beginning  of  better  things. 
As  the  little  fleet  advanced  toward  the  south,  they 
found  the  country  ever  fairer  and  the  weather 
more  temperate.  There  was  an  abundance  of 
game,  of  which  there  had  hitherto  been  an  excep- 
tional lack.  They  passed  the  Chicago  River  and 
circled  the  end  of  the  lake,  landing  at  the  mouth 
of  the  St.  Joseph.  Here  La  Salle  waited  for 
Tonty  to  join  them,  employing  the  time  in  build- 
ing a  fort.  On  the  third  of  December  the  party 
sailed  up  the  river,  bound  for  the  villages  of  the 
Illinois.  On  a  later  trip  in  1682  La  Salle  reached 
the  Illinois  settlements  by  a  shorter  route,  cross- 


La  Salle  on  the  Great  Lakes  71 

ing  from  his  fort  to  the  river  Chicago,  and  jour- 
neying from  its  waters  into  a  northern  branch  of 
the  Illinois  River. 

In  four  months  La  Salle  had  traversed  the 
length  of  Lake  Erie,  had  passed  through  the 
strait  of  Detroit,  up  Lake  Huron,  through 
the  Straits  of  Mackinac,  and  down  Lake  Michi- 
gan ;  from  the  sites  of  Buffalo  and  Cleveland  he 
had  sailed  past  Detroit  and  Milwaukee  even  to 
Chicago,  and  had  then  journeyed  inland  to  the 
Illinois  River.  He  had  lost  his  vessel  and  her 
crew,  as  well  as  all  his  furs ;  he  had  met 
with  hostility  from  French  and  Indian  alike ;  he 
had  been  deserted  by  most  of  his  advance  party, 
and  had  held  his  own  crew  only  by  his  presence 
and  the  dominating  force  of  his  personality ;  he 
had  suffered  endless  hardships  and  privations : 
but  nothing  had  shaken  his  purpose.  In  later 
years  he  followed  the  Illinois  and  the  Mississippi  to 
the  Gulf  of  Mexico  and  led  a  colony  to  the  limits 
of  the  present  state  of  Texas,  where  he  was  mur- 
dered by  one  of  his  men.  In  history,  La  Salle 
stands  out  as  a  man  whose  courage  and  persever- 
ing fortitude  in  the  face  of  almost  insuperable 
obstacles  mark  him  as  one  of  the  greatest  explorers 
the  world  has  ever  known.  We  do  well  to  join 


72  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

with  Hennepin  in  saying,  "Those  who  shall  be 
so  happy  as  to  inhabit  that  noble  country  cannot 
but  remember  with  gratitude  those  who  discovered 
the  way  by  venturing  to  sail  upon  unknown 
lakes." 


CHAPTER   VII 

A    HAPLESS    FRENCH    GOVERNOR 

LIKE  all  strong  men  Frontenac  made 
many  enemies.  He  was  recalled  in  1682, 
and  General  La  Barre,  a  man  of  about 
sixty,  was  sent  out  in  his  place.  La  Barre  had 
made  a  good  record  in  the  West  Indies,  but  was 
entirely  unable  to  handle  the  difficult  problems 
which  met  him  in  New  France.  In  an  evil  hour 
for  the  French,  the  Iroquois  had  conquered  the 
southern  neighbors  with  whom  they  had  long 
waged  wars  that  had  occupied  much  of  their  time 
and  strength.  Now,  they  were  free  to  turn  on 
the  Indian  allies  of  Canada  of  whose  commercial 
gains  through  the  fur  trade  with  the  French  they 
had  long  been  envious.  Frontenac  before  his  de- 
parture had  found  the  Iroquois  unusually  arrogant 
and  unruly,  although  they  had  come  to  regard 
him  as  the  greatest  of  all  "  Onontios,"  as  they 
named  the  governors  of  New  France.  The 
Dutch  and  the  English  had  meanwhile  made 

73 


74  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

more  or  less  successful  advances  to  the  Iroquois, 
who  now  fully  realized  their  own  importance 
from  the  efforts  of  both  French  and  English  to 
gain  their  support. 

For  two  years  La  Barre  struggled  on,  entan- 
gling rather  than  helping  the  situation.  At  length 
an  Iroquois  chief  was  murdered  in  a  village  of 
French  Indians,  and  the  crisis  came.  In  the  early 
spring  of  1684,  French  canoes  were  plundered  by 
the  Senecas  and  La  Barre  felt  that  he  must  assert 
his  power,  or  the  Indians  would  lose  their  respect 
for  the  French.  After  making  great  preparations, 
he  started  with  his  soldiers  and  frontiersmen  for 
the  Seneca  country  by  way  of  the  St.  Lawrence 
to  Fort  Frontenac  and  thence  across  Lake  On- 
tario. The  opposing  current  of  the  river  was  so 
strong  that  frequently  the  men  could  make  no 
progress  by  paddling,  but  were  obliged  to  tow  the 
canoes  or  push  them  along  with  poles.  Every 
few  miles  were  rapids  around  which  the  canoes 
were  transported  and  through  which  the  flatboats 
were  pulled  with  the  greatest  effort.  The  mos- 
quitoes were  cc  insufferably  troublesome,"  hovering 
over  the  men  in  such  clouds  that  they  could 
hardly  see  their  way,  —  so  one  of  the  soldiers 
wrote.  At  Fort  Frontenac,  the  men  fell  ill  of  a 


A  Hapless   French  Governor  75 

malarial  fever  which  killed  many  and  disabled 
more.  La  Barre  repented  more  than  once  of 
entering  upon  an  expedition  that  he  now  saw 
would  be  disastrous. 

Whatever  his  former  warlike  purposes,  La 
Barre  was  now  eager  for  peace.  He  sent  Le 
Moyne,  a  veteran  interpreter  whom  the  Iroquois 
called  the  "  Partridge,"  to  the  Onondagas  asking 
them  to  meet  him  on  the  southern  side  of  the 
lake,  twenty  miles  or  so  north  of  Oswego.  Le 
Moyne  returned  in  a  few  days  with  the  famous 
Onondaga  chief,  "  Big  Mouth  "  ;  in  French  this 
is  "  La  Grande  Gueule,"  which  the  soldiers  short- 
ened into  "  Grangula."  Big  Mouth  had  recently 
been  conferring  with  the  English,  whose  arbitrary 
demands  had  offended  his  pride ;  he  was  now  in 
a  haughty  mood  that  boded  ill  for  the  French. 

The  Indian  chief  was  accompanied  by  a  train 
of  thirty  young  warriors.  As  soon  as  he  disem- 
barked, General  La  Barre  sent  him  a  present  of 
bread  and  wine,  and  thirty  salmon-trouts.  At 
the  same  time  he  gave  him  to  understand  that 
he  was  pleased  at  his  arrival,  and  would  be  glad 
to  have  an  interview  with  him  after  he  had  rested 
himself.  To  conceal  from  Big  Mouth  the  weak- 
ness of  the  French  forces  Le  Moyne  represented 


76  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

to  him  that  the  most  of  the  soldiers  had  been  left 
behind  at  Fort  Frontenac,  and  that  the  troops 
which  he  saw  were  the  general's  guards ;  but  one 
of  the  Iroquois  knew  a  little  of  the  French  tongue. 
Strolling  noiselessly  about  the  tents  by  night  he 
overheard  the  talk  of  the  soldiers  and  learned  the 
true  state  of  affairs. 

It  was  two  days  after  his  arrival  before  Big 
Mouth  gave  notice  to  La  Barre  that  he  was  ready 
for  an  interview.  The  council  was  held  on  an 
open  spot  between  the  two  encampments.  From 
the  picture  drawn  by  one  of  the  French  soldiers 
we  see  the  arrangement.  La  Barre  was  seated  in 
state  in  an  armchair  with  his  Jesuit  interpreter 
beside  him  and  the  French  officers  ranged  on  his 
right  and  left.  The  two  lines  of  French  soldiers 
formed  two  more  sides  of  the  square.  Opposite 
La  Barre  sat  the  Indians  with  Big  Mouth,  their 
spokesman,  in  front,  and  between  them  in  the 
centre  of  the  square  was  placed  the  great  Calumet 
or  Pipe  of  Peace.  The  stem  of  this  huge  pipe 
was  about  four  feet  long,  and  the  body  or  bowl 
about  eight  inches  high.  The  bowl  was  of  hand- 
some red  stone,  well  polished,  and  the  stem  of 
a  strong  reed  or  cane,  trimmed  with  yellow,  white, 
and  green  feathers.  In  shape  it  resembled  a  huge 


44444444 


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LA  BARRE  AND   GRANGULA 


THE 

UNIVERSITY 

OF 


A  Hapless  French  Governor  77 

hammer  more  than  anything  else.  The  Indians 
used  these  calumets  for  negotiations  as  we  use  a 
flag  of  truce,  holding  them  peculiarly  sacred.  To 
violate  the  rights  of  this  venerable  pipe  was  re- 
garded among  them  as  a  flaming  crime  that  would 
draw  down  mischief  upon  their  nations.  About 
this  calumet  were  piled  the  wampum  belts  to  be 
presented  by  the  speakers. 

La  Barre  opened  the  council,  speaking  boldly 
and  with  apparent  assurance.  He  made  no  al- 
lusion to  his  original  purpose  of  making  war  on 
the  Senecas,  but  announced  that  the  king,  his 
master,  had  sent  him  there  with  a  guard  to  meet 
the  principal  chiefs  of  the  Five  Nations  at  an 
appointed  council  fire.  The  Five  Nations  had 
made  infractions  upon  the  peace  concluded  be- 
tween them  and  the  French.  Should  Big  Mouth 
be  willing,  as  their  representative,  to  make  rep- 
aration and  offer  promises  for  the  future,  the 
great  French  monarch  desired  that  La  Barre  and 
Big  Mouth  should  smoke  together  the  calumet 
of  peace. 

La  Barre  recounted  the  three  offences  of  the 
Iroquois.  They  had  robbed  and  ill-used  French 
traders ;  for  this  he  demanded  reparation.  They 
had  brought  the  English  to  the  lakes  which  be- 


78  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

longed  to  the  French,  thus  diverting  trade  from 
the  latter ;  this  he  would  forget,  provided  it  did 
not  happen  again.  They  had  attacked  the  Illinois, 
and  still  held  many  in  captivity.  "  These  people 
are  my  master's  children,"  said  La  Barre,  "  and 
must  therefore  cease  to  be  your  slaves."  They 
must  be  sent  home  at  once.  He  enforced  each 
statement  with  a  wampum  belt,  and  ended  every 
request  with  an  announcement,  as  bold  as  though 
he  had  the  whole  French  army  at  his  back,  that 
should  these  demands  not  be  complied  with,  he 
"  had  express  orders  to  declare  war,"  even  going 
so  far  once  as  to  say,  "in  case  of  your  refusal, 
war  is  positively  proclaimed."  He  would  gladly 
leave  them  in  peace,  should  they  prove  "religious 
observers  of  the  treaties,"  but  if  not  he  added, 
concluding  with  a  statement  which  he  knew  to  be 
false,  he  would  be  obliged  to  join  the  governor  of 
New  York,  who  had  orders  from  his  king  to 
assist  La  Barre  in  burning  the  five  villages  and 
cutting  off  the  Iroquois. 

While  La  Barre's  interpreter  translated  this 
speech,  Grangula  sat  silent  and  attentive,  gazing 
steadily  at  the  bowl  of  his  pipe.  After  the  ha- 
rangue was  finished  he  rose  and  walked  round 
inside  the  square  made  by  the  French  and  savages, 


A  Hapless   French  Governor  79 

five  or  six  times.  Then  he  returned  to  his  place, 
and  drawing  himself  to  his  full  height  began  to 
speak.  "  Onontio,  I  honor  you/'  he  said,  "  and 
all  the  warriors  that  accompany  me  do  the  same. 
Your  interpreter  has  made  an  end  of  his  discourse, 
and  now  I  come  to  begin  mine.  My  voice  glides 
to  your  ear,  pray  listen  to  my  words." 

He  thought  that  the  French  captain  must  have 
started  out  from  Quebec  with  some  strange  idea 
that  the  Five  Nations  had  been  wiped  out  by  fire 
or  flood.  Nothing  else,  he  implied,  could  make 
him  set  out  against  so  powerful  a  federation  with 
such  an  army.  The  Indian  chief  ironically  as- 
sured the  French  general  of  the  continued  pros- 
perity of  the  Five  Nations,  congratulating  him 
that  he  brought  the  calumet  of  peace,  rather  than 
the  bloody  axe  that  had  been  so  often  dyed  with 
the  blood  of  the  French.  Then  he  spoke  out 
boldly  and  directly,  telling  La  Barre  that  he  knew 
better  than  to  believe  the  Frenchman's  pretence 
that  he  did  not  have  any  other  purpose  in  ap- 
proaching the  lake  than  to  smoke  the  pipe  of 
peace  with  the  Onondagas.  He  saw  plainly  that 
the  Onontio  meant  to  "knock  them  on  the  head," 
if  the  French  arms  had  not  been  so  much  weak- 
ened. The  French  soldiers  were  to  be  congratu- 


8o  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

lated  that  the  Great  Spirit  had  visited  them  with 
sickness,  for  only  thus  had  their  lives  been  saved 
from  Indian  massacre.  Even  the  women  and 
old  men  and  children  would  have  attacked  the 
French  camp  without  fear,  had  not  Akouessan 
(Le  Moyne)  appeared  at  the  Onondaga  village 
announcing  that  he  was  an  ambassador  of  peace, 
not  of  war. 

With  this  bold  and  telling  introduction,  in 
which  he  revealed  to  the  French  his  full  compre- 
hension of  their  weakness  and  of  their  deceit,  Big 
Mouth  proceeded  to  consider  the  accusations  of 
La  Barre.  The  pillage  of  French  traders  he  justi- 
fied on  the  ground  that  they  were  carrying  arms 
to  the  Illinois,  and  for  this  he  flatly  refused  to 
give  satisfaction,  declaring  insultingly  that  even 
the  old  men  of  his  tribe  had  long  ceased  to  fear 
the  French.  They  had  conducted  the  English  to 
the  lakes  to  traffic  with  French  allies,  just  as  the 
Algonquins  conducted  the  French  to  the  Five 
Nations  to  trade  with  them.  Moreover,  he 
claimed  that  they  had  a  perfect  right  to  do  as 
they  pleased  in  this  matter.  "  We  are  born  free- 
men/' he  declared  proudly,  "and  have  no  de- 
pendence either  upon  the  Onontio  [governor  of 
Canada],  or  the  Corker  [governor  of  New  York]. 


A  Hapless  French  Governor  81 

We  have  power  to  go  where  we  please,  to  con- 
duct whoever  we  will  to  the  places  we  resort  to, 
and  to  buy  and  sell  where  we  think  fit."  If  the 
French  chose  they  might  make  slaves  of  their 
allies,  robbing  them  of  the  liberty  of  entertaining 
any  other  Indians,  but  the  Five  Nations  would 
brook  no  such  interference.  The  Iroquois  at- 
tacked the  Illinois  because  they  invaded  their 
territory,  hunting  beavers  on  their  lands.  Big 
Mouth  met  the  reproof  of  La  Barre  with  a  bold 
stroke  in  return.  He  declared  that  in  defending 
their  own  lands  against  the  Illinois  they  had  done 
less  than  the  English  and  French,  who  without 
any  right,  had  usurped  the  grounds  they  now 
possessed,  dislodging  from  them  several  nations 
in  order  to  make  way  for  the  building  of  their 
cities,  villages,  and  forts. 

Big  Mouth  closed  his  address  with  a  warning. 
A  year  ago  the  hatchet  had  been  buried  in  the 
presence  of  Count  Frontenac  at  his  fort,  and  the 
tree  of  peace  had  been  planted.  It  was  then  stipu- 
lated that  this  fort  should  be  used  as  a  place  of 
retreat  for  traders,  and  not  a  refuge  for  soldiers. 
Big  Mouth  warned  the  French  to  take  care  lest 
so  great  a  number  of  soldiers  as  he  now  saw 
before  him  "  stifle  and  choke  the  tree  of  peace," 


82  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

and  hinder  it  from  shading  both  countries  with 
its  leaves.  The  Iroquois  were  ready  to  dance 
under  its  branches  the  dance  of  peace,  and  never 
dig  up  the  hatchet  to  cut  it  down,  unless  the 
governors  of  Canada  and  New  York,  jointly  or 
separately,  should  invade  the  country  given  by  the 
Great  Spirit  to  their  ancestors.  The  Indian  ora- 
tor presented  two  wampum  belts  and  sat  down. 

As  soon  as  he  had  done,  Le  Moyne  and  the 
Jesuits  interpreted  his  answer  to  La  Barre,  who 
thereupon  retired  to  his  tent  and  stormed  and 
blustered  till  somebody  came  and  represented  to 
him  that  good  manners  were  not  to  be  expected 
from  an  Iroquois.  It  was  little  wonder  that 
La  Barre  raged.  The  Indian  chief  had  seen 
through  his  artifices,  had  yielded  to  none  of  his 
demands,  and  had  contrived  to  assert  the  com- 
plete independence  of  his  own  tribes  and  their 
contempt  for  the  French. 

Big  Mouth  entertained  some  of  the  French 
officers  at  a  feast,  which  he  opened  for  them  by 
dancing  an  Indian  dance.  There  was  another 
council  in  the  afternoon,  and  the  terms  of  peace 
were  settled  upon  in  the  evening.  These  terms 
were  in  the  usual  form  of  Indian  treaties.  A 
"  word"  of  the  Iroquois  was  answered  by  a  "word" 


A  Hapless  French  Governor  83 

of.  the  French  accepting  it,  and  all  disputed 
points  were  taken  up  in  a  series  of  such  "words/' 

The  Iroquois  offered  to  the  French  a  beverage 
devoid  of  bitterness  to  purify  whatever  inconven- 
ience they  had  experienced  on  their  voyage,  and 
to  dispel  whatever  bad  air  they  had  breathed 
between  Montreal  and  this  council  fire,  —  a  bev- 
erage of  which  the  malarial  French  were  certainly 
in  dire  need.  They  reminded  the  French  of  the 
deep  ditch  dug  the  year  before,  into  which  all 
unkind  things  that  might  occur  were  to  be  cast, 
and  requested  the  French  to  throw  into  it  the 
Seneca  robbery,  to  which  the  French  agreed. 
Again  the  tree  of  peace  was  set  up,  each  side  sol- 
emnly adjuring  the  other  to  sustain  and  strengthen 
it.  The  French  agreed  to  depart  at  once,  and 
then,  —  and  not  till  then,  —  did  the  Iroquois  con- 
sent to  renew  the  former  treaty,  "  dispelling  all  the 
clouds  that  had  obscured  the  Sun  from  their  sight." 

Thus  ended  the  grand  expedition  of  La  Barre. 
No  real  satisfaction  had  been  gained  by  the 
French,  but  a  weak  truce  had  been  made,  and 
the  Iroquois  had  taken  the  opportunity  to  assert 
boldly  their  independence  of  French  and  English 
alike,  whom  they  treated  as  invaders  of  their 
rightful  possessions. 


84  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

Big  Mouth  and  his  men  returned  to  their 
homes,  and  the  French  set  out  for  Montreal. 
The  few  healthy  men  that  remained  manned  the 
General's  canoes  and  took  charge  of  the  flat- 
bottomed  boats  in  which  the  soldiers  were  carried. 
Of  the  dangers  attendant  on  shooting  the  rapids 
in  these  boats  one  of  the  soldiers  draws  a  vivid  pic- 
ture, declaring  that  he  and  his  companions  wished 
themselves  back  in  the  canoes  that  had  brought 
them  up,  when  they  shot  down  such  precipices  of 
water  as  had  never  been  heard  of  before.  The 
main  current  wound  its  way  in  and  out  past  eddies 
and  rocks,  dashing  along  as  fast  as  a  cannon  ball, 
and  the  men  steered  as  well  as  they  could  along 
this  zigzag  course,  knowing  that  a  false  stroke  of 
the  oar  would  send  them  upon  the  rocks.  But  in 
spite  of  the  discomfort  and  the  danger,  this  soldier 
confesses  from  the  safe  shelter  of  Montreal  that, 
though  the  risk  was  very  great,  "yet,  by  way  of 
compensation  one  had  the  satisfaction  of  running 
a  great  way  in  a  very  short  time."  And  he  closes 
with  a  word  of  sympathy  for  La  Barre.  "All  the 
world  blames  our  General  for  his  bad  success.  .  .  . 
The  people  here  are  busy  in  wafting  to  court  a 
thousand  calumnies  against  him.  .  .  .  But  after  all 
the  poor  man  could  do  no  more  than  he  did." 


PART   II 
THE   STRUGGLE   FOR   POSSESSION 


CHAPTER   VIII 

THE    FOUNDING    OF    DETROIT 

AFTER  the  failure  which  has  been  re- 
counted in  the  preceding  chapter,  La 
Barre  was  recalled  to  France,  and  a  new 
governor,  Denonville,  sent  over  to  take  his  place. 
He  had  not  much  greater  success  and  was  in  turn 
replaced  by  Count  Frontenac,  who  returned  to 
the  scene  of  his  former  labors.  This  was  in 
1689,  when  England  and  France  were  at  wai\ 
For  the  remaining  nine  years  of  his  life  Fron- 
tenac devoted  all  his  energies  to  defending  New 
France  against  the  English  and  the  Iroquois  and 
to  holding  what  the  French  had  already  gained 
on  the  Great  Lakes.  •  In  November,  1698,  in  his 
seventy-eighth  year,  he  died,  and  was  deeply 
mourned  as  a  strong  governor  and  beloved 
leader.  He  had  come  out  to  New  France  in 
1672,  and  during  his  long  term  of  service  he  had 
used  his  power  and  influence  not  only  to  build 
up  the  settlements  on  the  St.  Lawrence,  but  also 

87 


88  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

to  plant  on  the  shores  of  the  Great  Lakes  and 
the  rivers  beyond  a  line  of  French  forts  and  trad- 
ing posts.  He  had  gathered  about  him  a  group 
of  young  men  who  shared  his  enthusiasm  for 
expansion  and  were  eager  to  carry  on  his  work. 
Five  years  before  his  death,  Frontenac  had  sent 
one  of  his  men,  Cadillac,  to  the  Straits  of  Mack- 
inac  to  hold  that  centre  of  the  fur  trade. 

Cadillac  was  a  rough,  forceful  soldier  who  was 
summary  in  his  methods  and  short  in  his  speech. 
He  was  well  suited  to  the  command  of  a  frontier 
post  and  did  good  work  in  keeping  the  lake 
Indians  from  alliance  with  the  enemies  of  the 
French.  He  did  not,  however,  get  on  well  with 
the  missionaries  at  Michilimackinac.  They 
resented  his  presence  and  his  influence  with  the 
Indians,  for  whose  conversion  to  Christianity  they 
were  earnestly  laboring.  Cadillac  soon  came  to 
see  that  Detroit  and  not  Mackinac  was  the  key 
to  the  interior.  Whoever  held  the  narrow 
channel  connecting  Lake  Erie  and  Lake  Huron 
would  control  the  fur  trade  of  the  whole  lake 
region.  He  hastened  to  Quebec  to  gain  support 
for  his  scheme  of  erecting  a  fort  and  trading  sta- 
tion on  the  Detroit  River.  There  he  was  stoutly 
opposed  by  the  Jesuits,  who  foresaw  that  the 


The  Founding  of  Detroit  89 

carrying  out  of  his  project  would  mean  the  ruin 
of  their  mission,  which  could  not  compete  com- 
mercially with  the  new  station,  and  that  the 
extension  of  trade  would  bring  the  vices  of 
civilization  to  the  natives.  Nothing  daunted, 
Cadillac  went  over  the  seas  to  France,  gained 
the  favor  of  the  colonial  minister,  and  returned 
to  Canada  with  permission  to  found  his  colony. 
He  reached  Detroit  with  a  band  of  one  hundred 
colonists  and  soldiers  on  the  24th  of  July,  1701. 
Cadillac  had  done  well  in  choosing  Detroit  as 
the  situation  for  the  first  permanent  colony  on 
the  lakes.  In  the  century  that  was  past  the 
Great  Lakes  had  been  discovered  and  explored ; 
the  eighteenth  century  was  to  witness  their  occu- 
pation and  the  contest  for  the  possession  of  this 
rich  country.  In  this  long  strife,  first  France 
and  England,  and  then  England  and  the  Ameri- 
can colonies,  were  to  come  to  blows,  while  always 
on  these  shores  unceasing  warfare  would  be 
waged  between  the  advancing  white  man  and  the 
retreating  red  man.  In  the  opening  years  of  the 
new  century  Cadillac  was  -taking  the  first  step  in 
permanent  occupation  of  the  country,  planting 
his  settlement?  on  a  site  so  important  that  a  wise 
English  leader  was  at  that  very  time  urging  upon 


90  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

the  New  York  assembly  its  colonization  by  the 
English.  So  long  as  Lake  Erie  and  Lake  On- 
tario had  been  avoided  by  the  French,  the  north- 
ern Ottawa  River-Georgian  Bay  route  had  been 
the  highway  of  travel  and  trade.  The  easier 
southern  route  was  now  open  to  the  French,  but 
it  was  even  more  convenient  and  accessible  to 
their  English  rivals.  The  French  were  brought 
face  to  face  with  the  problem  of  how  to  hold  the 
trade  of  the  upper  lakes  from  the  English.  In 
the  solution  of  this  problem  Detroit  would  be 
the  key. 

There  rushes  through  the  strait  of  Detroit 
more  water  than  through  any  other  river  in  the 
world,  save  only  the  Niagara  and  the  St.  Law- 
rence. Through  this  channel,  whose  average 
width  is  a  mile  and  whose  length  is  only  twenty- 
seven  miles,  pour  in  a  steady,  even  current,  un- 
broken by  rapids  or  eddies,  and  with  a  speed  of 
over  two  miles  an  hour,  the  waters  of  three  lakes, 
Superior,  Michigan,  and  Huron,  and  of  the 
hundreds  of  streams  that  feed  them.  This  little 
river  is  the  natural  outlet  for  eighty-two  thousand 
square  miles  of  lake  surface  and  one  hundred 
and  twenty-five  thousand  square  miles  of  land. 
Down  the  swift  current  floated  in  those  early  days 


The   Founding  of  Detroit  91 

scores  of  canoes  paddled  by  silent  Indians  and 
swarthy  coureurs  de  bois,  bearing  to  the  mar- 
kets at  Montreal,  Quebec,  and  Albany  loads  of 
beaver,  mink,  and  otter  furs  of  immense  value. 
They  were  the  forerunners  of  a  tonnage  pass- 
ing through  that  strait  which  to-day  exceeds  that 
of  the  Thames  and  London. 

Cadillac  and  his  soldiers  and  settlers,  fifty  each, 
had  paddled,  pushed,  and  carried  their  canoes, 
heavily  laden  with  provisions,  tools,  ammunition, 
and  supplies,  all  the  way  from  Montreal.  As 
they  gazed  on  the  beautiful  site  of  their  future 
homes,  their  weariness  passed  away.  With  shouts 
of  joy  they  drew  their  canoes  to  the  bank  and 
unpacked  their  heavy  loads  for  the  last  time. 

No  exploring  party  had  ever  passed  through 
the  Detroit  River  without  longing  to  stop.  To 
appreciate  the  charm  and  wealth  of  that  spot,  one 
must  read  the  vivid  descriptions  which  were 
written  by  men  of  that  time.  Such  an  enthusiast 
was  Cadillac.  Two  months  after  his  arrival,  he 
wrote  home  the  following,  which  would  do  credit 
to  a  promoter's  prospectus  of  the  present  day. 

"  The  business  of  war  being  so  different  from 
that  of  writing/  he  said,  "  I  have  not  the  ability 
to  make  a  portrait  of  a  country  so  worthy  of  a 


92  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

better  pen  than  mine  ;  but  since  you  have  di- 
rected me  to  render  an  account  of  it,  I  will  do 
so."  He  described  the  river  and  then  continued : 
"  Its  borders  are  so  many  vast  prairies,  and  the 
freshness  of  the  beautiful  waters  keeps  the  banks 
always  green.  The  prairies  are  bordered  by  long 
and  broad  rows  of  fruit  trees  which  have  never 
felt  the  hand  of  the  vigilant  gardener.  Here 
also  orchards,  young  and  old,  soften  and  bend 
their  branches,  under  the  weight  and  quantity  of 
their  fruit,  towards  the  mother  earth  which  has 
produced  them.  It  is  in  this  land,  so  fertile,  that 
the  ambitious  vine,  which  has  never  wept  under 
the  knife  of  the  vine-dresser,  builds  a  thick  roof 
with  its  large  leaves  and  heavy  clusters,  weighing 
down  the  top  of  the  tree  which  receives  it,  and 
often  stifling  it  with  its  embrace. 

"Under  these  broad  walks  one  sees  assembled 
by  hundred  the  timid  deer  and  fawn,  also  the 
squirrel  bounding  in  his  eagerness  to  collect  the 
apples  and  plums  with  which  the  earth  is  covered. 
Here  the  cautious  turkey  calls  and  conducts  her 
numerous  brood  to  gather  the  grapes,  and  here 
also  their  mates  come  to  fill  their  large  and  glutton- 
ous crops.  Golden  pheasants,  the  quail,  the  par- 
tridge, woodcock,  and  numerous  doves  swarm  in 


The  Founding  of  Detroit  93 

the  woods  and  cover  the  country,  which  is  dotted 
and  broken  with  thickets  and  high  forests  of  full- 
grown  trees.  .  .  .  There  are  ten  species  of  forest 
trees,  among  them  are  the  walnut,  white  oak,  red 
oak,  the  ash,  the  pine,  whitewood  and  cotton- 
wood  ;  straight  as  arrows,  without  knots,  and 
almost  without  branches,  except  at  the  very  top, 
and  of  prodigious  size.  .  .  .  The  fish  here  are 
nourished  and  bathed  by  living  water  of  crystal 
clearness,  and  their  great  abundance  renders  them 
none  the  less  delicious.  Swans  are  so  numerous 
that  one  would  take  for  lilies  the  reeds  in  which 
they  are  crowded  together.  The  gabbling  goose, 
the  duck,  the  widgeon  [a  kind  of  duck],  and  the 
bustard  are  so  abundant  that  to  give  an  idea  of 
their  numbers  I  must  use  the  expression  of  a 
savage  whom  I  asked  before  arriving  if  there 
was  much  game.  c  So  much/  he  said,  c  that  they 
draw  up  in  lines  to  let  the  boats  pass  through/ 
.  .  .  In  a  word,  the  climate  is  temperate,  and 
the  air  purified  through  the  day  and  night  by  a 
gentle  breeze.  The  skies  are  always  serene  and 
spread  sweet  and  fresh  influence  which  makes  one 
enjoy  a  tranquil^leep." 

Cadillac  landed   at  the  narrowest   part   of  the 
river,  where  the  city  now  stands,  and   began  to 


94  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

build  the  little  village  which  was  to  survive  with- 
out a  break  the  conflicts  of  the  coming  century. 
In  this  wilderness,  inhabited  only  by  wild  beasts 
and  savages,  the  first  thought  must  be  for  de- 
fence ;  only  when  that  was  provided,  could  the 
settlers  turn  to  plans  for  their  own  shelter  from 
wind  and  weather.  On  the  first  rise  of  ground 
back  from  the  river,  along  the  line  of  the  present 
Jefferson  Avenue,  Cadillac  marked  out  a  space 
of  a  little  less  than  an  acre,  with  a  width  of  about 
two  city  blocks  and  a  depth  of  one,  which  was  to 
be  enclosed  by  a  palisade.  Small  trees  were  hewn 
in  the  forest  and  fashioned  into  sharply  pointed 
pickets  which  were  driven  into  the  ground  as 
closely  as  possible,  thus  forming  a  solid  fence 
ten  or  twelve  feet  high.  At  the  four  corners 
were  bastions  of  stout  oak  pickets  from  which 
the  soldiers  could  shoot  along  the  line  of  the 
palisade.  Inside  the  stockade,  Cadillac  laid  out 
a  street  twelve  feet  wide,  and  assigned  small  lots 
to  the  settlers  and  soldiers.  The  settlers  bought 
theirs  outright,  but  Cadillac  retained  the  owner- 
ship of  the  others. 

Fifty  hours  after  their  landing,  on  the  day 
sacred  to  St.  Anne,  they  began  the  foundation 
of  a  chapel  on  the  very  spot  where  St.  Anne's 


The  Founding  of  Detroit  95 

church  stands  to-day.  In  a  month  the  chapel 
was  completed  by  a  rude  cross  placed  over  the 
door,  and  a  bell  summoned  the  colonists  to  daily 
prayers.  When  the  storehouse  and  magazine  for 
ammunition  were  also  finished  the  people  set  to 
work  on  their  own  log  huts.  Trees  were  cut  in 
the  forest,  and  the  rough-hewn  logs  were  hauled 
to  the  spot.  There  a  framework  was  set  up,  the 
logs  were  fitted  into  it,  and  the  cracks  were  filled 
with  mortar  and  mud.  Last  of  all  the  top  was 
covered  with  a  roof  of  birch  bark,  or  was  thatched 
with  grass.  Land  outside  the  stockade  was  as- 
signed for  agriculture,  each  soldier  having  a  half 
acre  for  cultivation,  and  the  civilians  larger  tracts. 
That  very  year  wheat  was  sown  for  the  next  sum- 
mer. With  remarkable  speed  the  settlement 
sprang  up  in  the  wilderness,  and  before  the  end 
of  August  took  on  an  appearance  of  stability  and 
permanence. 

Cadillac  now  summoned  the  Indians  to  council 
and  urged  them  to  build  settlements  in  the  vicin- 
ity. He  was  wise  enough  to  see  that  if  a  suffi- 
cient number  of  friendly  Indians  located  near  by, 
traders  would  come  to  buy  their  furs,  the  colony 
could  rely  on  greater  numbers  in  case  of  attack, 
and  the  scanty  three  months'  supply  of  provisions 


96  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

brought  from  Montreal  could  be  eked  out  by 
food  bought  from  Indian  hunters.  Three  large 
villages  sprang  up,  and  within  eight  months  the 
population  of  the  strait  was  some  six  thousand 
people,  whites  and  Indians. 

Hitherto  there  had  been  on  the  Great  Lakes 
nothing  looking  to  family  life  or  permanent  resi- 
dence, but  in  the  spring  of  1702,  Madame  Cadillac 
and  Madame  Tonty,  wife  of  the  captain  of  the 
garrison,  started  in  open  canoes,  manned  by 
Indians  and  Canadians,  on  the  seven-hundred- 
mile  journey  from  Montreal  to  Detroit.  At  a 
season  when  storms  were  likely  to  be  frequent 
these  two  women  braved  the  hardships  of  the 
trip,  going  up  the  rapids  of  the  St.  Lawrence, 
across  Lake  Ontario  and  around  Niagara,  and  up 
Lake  Erie  to  the  strait.  With  her  Madame 
Cadillac  brought  her  little  boy,  Jacques,  six  years 
of  age  ;  her  oldest  son  was  already  with  his  father. 
These  were  the  first  white  women  to  come  to  the 
Great  Lakes.  They  were  soon  followed  by  the 
wives  and  families  of  other  settlers.  By  1708  the 
settlement  had  grown  so  fast  that  houses  were 
built  outside  the  stockade,  as  the  twenty-nine  huts 
within  the  enclosure  were  not  sufficient  to  accom- 
modate the  people. 


The  Founding  of  Detroit  97 

The  little  colony  suffered  the  usual  troubles  of 
frontier  life,  but  managed  to  survive  them.  In 
1703  several  of  the  buildings  were  destroyed  by  a 
fire  set  by  the  Indians.  For  the  first  few  years 
the  colony  was  managed  by  a  company,  but  in 
1705  Cadillac  succeeded  in  getting  full  control 
and  ruled  there  with  as  absolute  sway  as  had  any 
feudal  chief  in  his  turreted  castle.  He  owned  the 
public  buildings  and  defences  and  he  alone  could 
grant  lots  for  settlement.  From  him  alone  could 
the  people  obtain  their  liquor,  and  to  prevent 
excessive  drinking  by  the  Indians  and  traders  he 
restricted  the  amount  sold  to  each  person  at  one 
time  and  charged  a  high  price  for  it.  To  him 
also  all  must  come  for  permits  to  carry  on  their 
different  trades  and  occupations.  For  every 
privilege  the  people  must  pay,  and  right  bitterly 
did  they  complain  of  their  commandant  to  his 
enemies,  though  when  he  walked  along  the  nar- 
row street,  firm  and  erect,  in  soldierly  costume 
and  with  clanking  sword,  every  hat  was  doffed. 
Doubtless  some  of  his  charges  were  exorbitant, 
but  the  money  was  turned  back  into  the  improve- 
ment of  the  colony,  as,  for  instance,  to  build  a 
public  windmill  where  the  people  could  pay  to 
have  their  corn  ground.  The  blacksmith  com- 


98  The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

plained  that  he  had  to  pay  six  hundred  francs  a 
year  and  two  casks  of  ale  for  the  privilege  of 
blacksmithing,  besides  having  to  keep  all  Cadillac's 
horses  shod.  The  latter  task  could  not  have 
been  very  arduous,  for  until  1706  there  were  no 
horses  in  the  settlement,  and  of  the  three  that 
Cadillac  bought  in  that  year  only  one,  named 
Colin,  was  alive  in  1711. 

In  1710  Cadillac  was  ordered  to  go  to 
Louisiana  to  govern  the  colony  there,  and  his 
connection  with  Detroit  and  the  Great  Lakes  was 
brought  to  an  abrupt  end.  The  settlement  which 
he  handed  over  to  his  successor  was  fairly  pros- 
perous. In  the  following  winter,  however,  while 
the  men  of  the  neighboring  Indian  tribes  were 
away  at  their  hunting-grounds,  a  thousand  or 
more  hostile  Indians  of  the  Fox-Wisconsin  river 
tribes  descended  upon  the  region  and  prepared  to 
settle  there.  The  colonists  were  powerless  to 
prevent  them,  but  waited  anxiously  for  the  return 
of  the  hunting-parties.  In  May  they  came,  and 
under  the  leadership  of  the  French  finally  drove 
off  the  enemy  after  a  hard  and  bloody  siege  in 
which  many  lives  were  lost.  For  the  next  ten 
years  the  colony  was  so  weak  that  its  abandon- 
ment was  contemplated.  Successive  governors 


The  Founding  of  Detroit  99 

mismanaged  its  internal  affairs,  demanding  tolls 
and  fees  so  exorbitant  that  traders  refused  to  come 
there.  Cadillac's  demands  had  been  for  the  ad- 
vancement of  the  colony  ;  these  men  used  their 
power  to  enrich  themselves. 

In  1720  and  1721,  financial  distress  in  France 
sent  many  a  ruined  Frenchman  to  Detroit,  so 
that  in  1722  the  population  was  again  two  hun- 
dred, as  it  had  been  at  the  time  of  its  founder's 
departure.  For  the  next  thirty  years  the  story 
of  Detroit  was  uneventful.  The  settlement  in- 
creased gradually  in  numbers  and  strength.  Of 
its  hardships  we  may  best  judge  by  the  large 
mortality  of  children  in  those  years.  By  the 
middle  of  the  century  we  find  the  authorities  in 
Canada  so  eager  to  have  the  colonies  on  the  Great 
Lakes  strong  and  permanent,  that  the  following 
inducements  are  offered  in  a  proclamation 
posted,  by  order  of  the  governor-general,  in  all 
the  parishes  of  Canada  :  — 

"  Every  man  who  will  go  to  settle  in  Detroit 
shall  receive  gratuitously,  one  spade,  one  axe,  one 
ploughshare,  one  large  and  one  small  wagon. 
We  will  make  an  advance  of  other  two  tools  to 
be  paid  for  in  two  years  only.  He  will  be  given 
a  cow,  .  .  .  also  a  sow.  Seed  will  be  advanced 


ioo         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

the  first  year,  to  be  returned  at  the  third  harvest. 
The  women  and  children  will  be  supported  for 
one  year.  Those  will  be  deprived  of  the  liber- 
ality of  the  King  who  shall  give  themselves  up 
to  trade  in  place  of  agriculture." 

In  this  way  men  with  families  were  encouraged 
to  make  France  strong  in  her  western  outposts. 
Within  a  year  one  hundred  persons  responded, 
and  an  official  census  shows  a  population  at 
Detroit  of  nearly  five  hundred  persons,  of  whom 
thirty-three  were  women  over  fifteen,  and  ninety- 
five  girls  under  that  age.  This  represents  no 
mere  floating  population  of  traders  and  adven- 
turers. The  property  returns  of  the  inhabitants 
show  them  to  have  been  an  agricultural  people 
who  made  the  most  of  the  rich  land  on  which 
they  lived.  In  the  census  they  reported  one 
hundred  and  sixty  horses  in  place  of  the  one  of 
forty  years  before,  and  six  hundred  and  eighty- 
two  cattle.  The  fertility  of  the  strait  of  Detroit 
seemed  to  inspire  even  the  roving  Canadian,  usu- 
ally, so  restless  and  adventurous,  with  a  desire  to 
plant  and  develop  a  home. 


CHAPTER    IX 

NIAGARA    AND    THE    LOSS    OF    CANADA 

THE  importance  of  Niagara  in  trade  and 
warfare  was  early  recognized  by  both  the 
French  and  the  English  as  well  as  by  the 
Iroquois.  La  Salle  and  Denonville,  in  their  desire 
to  monopolize  the  Indian  trade,  had  built  fortified 
storehouses  on  the  shore  of  the  river,  but  both 
had  been  destroyed  by  the  Iroquois.  By  the 
beginning  of  the  eighteenth  century,  the  English 
began  to  make  serious  inroads  on  the  fur  trade 
of  the  interior,  and  the  French  became  more 
anxious  than  ever  to  secure  a  permanent  foot- 
hold at  Niagara.  For  twenty-five  years  French 
and  English  orators  harangued  at  Indian  councils, 
begging  for  permission  to  build  forts  or  trading 
houses  at  that  point ;  governors  wrote  home  for 
the  necessary  funds  to  purchase  the  Indians' 
consent ;  and  rival  traders  watched  every  camp 
on  the  river  with  suspicion.  At  length  French 
diplomacy  won  the  day.  In  1720,  Joncaire,  with 


101 


IO2         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

the  help  of  Charles  Le  Moyne,  Chevalier  de 
Longueuil,  gained  from  the  Indians  a  reluctant 
consent  to  the  building  of  a  bark  house  at  Ni- 
agara. He  made  the  most  of  this  permission, 
and  on  the  site  of  Lewiston  built  a  large  house, 
forty  feet  wide  and  thirty  long,  which  could 
accommodate  fifty  traders.  This  he  surrounded 
with  a  high  fence  or  palisade  and  named  the 
Magazin  Royal.  In  their  turn  the  English  built 
a  similar,  though  smaller,  house  at  Oswego 
(1722),  from  which  the  Indians  could  go  by 
portage  by  the  Oswego  River  to  Lake  Oneida, 
and,  gaining  the  Mohawk,  could  paddle  their 
fur-laden  canoes  to  Albany. 

In  their  first  permission  to  the  French,  the 
Iroquois  had  carefully  stipulated  that  the  house 
to  be  built  at  Niagara  should  be  of  bark,  for  they 
had  learned  the  danger  of  stone  forts.  Now,  Le 
Moyne  told  them  that  he  could  not  keep  his 
skins  dry  in  a  bark  house,  and  wrung  from  them 
an  unwilling  consent  to  the  erection  of  a  stone 
house,  provided  it  be  "  no  stone  fort."  The 
authorities  at  once  wrote  to  the  king,  asking  for 
money  to  defray  the  expense  of  building  a  house 
of  solid  masonry.  De  Lery,  the  king's  chief 
engineer,  who  had  come  out  to  fortify  Quebec 


Niagara  and  the  Loss  of  Canada        103 

and  Montreal,  was  directed  to  proceed  to  Ni- 
agara, and  to  build  this  trading  house.  He 
decided  not  to  put  it  near  Joncaire's  station, 
which  was  seven  miles  up  the  river,  where  the 
rapids  made  further  navigation  impossible,  but 
to  place  it  at  the  outlet  of  the  river  into  Lake 
Ontario.  On  the  eastern  bank  of  the  Niagara, 
near  its  mouth,  he  began  the  erection  of  the  stone 
structure  which  stands  to-day  as  the  oldest  part 
of  the  government  buildings  at  Fort  Niagara.  It 
took  two  summers  in  time  and  thirty  thousand 
livres  in  money  to  build.  When  completed,  the 
house  of  stone  possessed  four  bastions  erected 
with  a  massiveness  of  construction  that  makes  it 
strong  after  nearly  two  hundred  years  have  passed 
away.  Charles  Le  Moyne,  who  had  gained  the 
Indians'  consent  to  the  building  of  this  stone 
house,  was  put  in  command  and  held  it  for  many 
years.  The  first  Charles  Le  Moyne  came  to 
Canada  in  1654,  and  for  a  century  his  sons  and 
grandsons  played  most  important  parts  in  the 
building  up  of  the  French  power  in  the  New 
World.  Two  of  his  sons  led  the  attack  on 
Schenectady,  and  later  founded  Louisiana ;  a  third 
son  fell  in  the  defence  of  Quebec  against  Sir  Will- 
iam Phips  in  1690,  and  another  in  the  struggle 


IO4         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes  . 

with  the  English  for  Hudson's  Bay.  The  sec- 
ond Charles  Le  Mqyne  accompanied  La  Barre 
and  Denonville  on  their  expeditions  against  the 
Iroquois,  and  the  third  established  this  fortified 
post  at  Niagara. 

In  a  hundred  and  forty  years,  more  or  less,  the 
French  had  made  wonderful  progress  in  opening 
up  the  interior  of  North  America  to  exploration 
and  trade;  they  had  founded  settlements  at  the 
extremities  of  their  dominion  on  the  St.  Law- 
rence and  the  lower  Mississippi,  and  had  con- 
nected these  by  a  chain  of  forts  on  the  Great 
Lakes  and  the  northern  tributaries  of  the  Missis- 
sippi ;  but  they  had  established  only  one  strong 
colony  in  the  interior,  the  settlement  at  Detroit. 
As  the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century  ap- 
proached, they  awoke  to  the  need  of  making 
good  their  claim  to  the  Ohio  Valley,  building  a 
line  of  forts  at  Presque  Isle  on  Lake  Erie,  Le 
Boeuf,  Venango,  and  Duquesne,  on  the  route 
from  that  lake  to  the  Ohio  River.  They  also 
strengthened  themselves  by  erecting  a  fort  on  the 
southern  shore  of  Lake  Erie  at  Sandusky,  about 
halfway  between  Cleveland  and  Detroit.  The 
energy  of  the  French  was  in  part  due  to  the  ex- 
hibition of  an  intention  of  the  English  to  enter 


OF  THE 

UNIVERSITY 

OF 


Niagara  and  the  Loss  of  Canada        105 

the  great  interior  basin ;  but  the  French  activity 
aroused  the  English,  and  in  1754  the  final  con- 
test for  the  control  of  the  continent  began  in  the 
western  wilderness  of  Virginia  and  Pennsylvania. 
With  the  war  elsewhere,  this  book  has  nothing 
to  do ;  the  campaigns  for  the  capture  of  Du- 
quesne,  Louisbourg,  Ticonderoga,  Quebec,  and 
Montreal,  all  took  place  far  away  from  the  shores 
of  the  Great  Lakes ;  but  it  was  the  success  of  the 
English  in  these  other  fields  that  determined  the 
fate  of  the  interior.  From  the  beginning  the  im- 
portance of  Niagara  had  been  recognized  by  both 
combatants,  but  the  strength  of  its  position  de- 
ferred an  attack  upon  it  for  several  years.  In 
1758  the  English  captured  Fort  Frontenac,  and 
the  next  summer  made  a  determined  attack  on 
Niagara. 

The  fort  at  Niagara  was  now  commanded  by  a 
French  officer  and  engineer,  Captain  Pouchot ; 
he  had  strengthened  and  enlarged  the  fortifica- 
tions and  had  a  garrison  of  six  hundred  men  well 
supplied  with  food  and  ammunition.  The  Eng- 
lish general,  Prideaux,  marched  with  a  force  of 
twenty-three  hundred  men  from  Oswego  and  laid 
siege  to  the  fort.  The  English  engineers  opened 
the  trenches  so  near  the  fort  that  they  were 


io6          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

obliged  to  withdraw  and  build  a  second  series. 
When  the  artillery  was  placed  in  position  and 
opened  fire,  one  of  the  first  shells  to  be  dis- 
charged burst  prematurely,  and  a  fragment  strik- 
ing General  Prideaux  on  the  head,  killed  him 
instantly.  Sir  William  Johnson  took  command 
in  his  place  and  carried  on  the  siege  effectively. 

In  two  or  three  weeks  the  French  garrison  was 
reduced  to  the  last  extremity.  The  walls  and 
defences  were  riddled  with  shot  and  broken 
through ;  more  than  a  hundred  of  the  defenders 
were  killed  or  seriously  wounded,  and  all  were 
worn  out  with  the  strain  of  the  constant  defence 
day  and  night.  Captain  Pouchot  still  held  out, 
for  ever  since  the  siege  began  he  had  been  watch- 
ing for  expected  assistance  from  the  western  posts. 
An  army  of  thirteen  hundred  French  and  Indians 
had  been  gathered  from  the  stations  of  the  Illinois 
River  and  from  Detroit,  Michilimackinac,  Le 
Boeuf,  and  Venango,  to  defend  the  Ohio  Valley. 
As  soon  as  Pouchot  heard  that  the  English  were 
coming  to  attack  Niagara  he  had  sent  a  summons 
to  the  leaders  of  this  force  to  come  to  his  aid,  and 
now  he  was  daily  and  hourly  expecting  their 
arrival,  together  with  the  garrison  of  Fort  Du- 
quesne,  which  had  abandoned  that  place  on  the 


Niagara  and  the   Loss  of  Canada        107 

approach  of  an  English  army  under  General 
Forbes. 

The  western  reinforcement  was  even  now  com- 
ing up  Lake  Erie  under  the  leadership  of  two 
French  generals.  It  was  an  oddly  assorted  force, 
such  as  no  other  time  or  place  could  have  pro- 
duced. A  company  of  well-drilled  colonial  militia 
paddled  their  boats  beside  the  canoes  of  a  war- 
party  of  Indians  who  had  been  induced  by  traders 
to  come  from  their  distant  homes  to  take  part  in 
the  white  men's  strife.  Hardly  less  savage  than 
the  Indian  warriors  were  the  western  traders  and 
coureurs  de  bois,  who  had  lived  so  long  in  Indian 
wigwams  that  they  had  adopted  the  dress,  the 
war-paint,  and  the  customs  of  their  neighbors. 
All  the  members  of  this  mixed  company  were 
alike,  however,  in  one  thing,  —  they  were  skilled 
in  the  warfare  of  the  woods. 

From  Lake  Erie  the  fleet  paddled  past  the  site 
of  Buffalo  and  down  the  swift-moving  Niagara 
River  around  Grand  Island,  and,  on  the  morn- 
ing of  July  24,  1759,  the  soldiers  and  Indians 
landed  at  the  head  of  the  portage  path,  a  mile 
and  a  half  above  the  falls.  Here  the  French 
found  the  ruins  of  their  Fort  of  the  Portage,  of 
Fort  Little  Niagara,  a  trading  station  which  had 


io8          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

been  fortified  in  1750.  Joncaire,  a  son  of  the 
Joncaire  who  built  the  first  trading  house  on  the 
river,  had  occupied  this  post  till  recently,  but  had 
burned  it  at  the  approach  of  the  British.  The 
army  made  its  way  up  over  the  rough  seven-mile 
portage  path  and  down  over  the  rocks  to  the  old 
French  trading  house.  From  here  they  pro- 
ceeded cautiously  along  the  bank  of  the  river. 

Sir  William  Johnson  had  meanwhile  been  in- 
formed by  scouts  of  the  approach  of  the  expected 
French  reenforcement.  He  divided  his  twenty- 
three  hundred  men  into  three  bodies,  —  one  to 
guard  the  boats  on  Lake  Ontario,  one  to  hold 
the  trenches,  and  the  third  to  cut  off  the  advance 
of  the  southern  army.  For  this  last  company  he 
picked  the  provincial  light  infantry,  two  com- 
panies of  grenadiers,  and  a  hundred  and  fifty  men 
of  the  Forty-sixth  Regiment.  They  were  com- 
manded by  Colonel  Massey,  under  whose  orders 
they  threw  up,  about  a  mile  and  a  half  up  the 
river  from  the  fort,  a  rough  breastwork  of  felled 
trees  behind  which  they  could  stand  and  pour  shot 
into  the  ranks  of  the  advancing  enemy.  The 
Iroquois  warriors  who  had  come  with  Johnson 
were  placed  along  the  flanks  of  the  English. 
They  had  recently  shown  signs  of  disaffection, 


Niagara  and  the  Loss  of  Canada        109 

and  when  the  French  army  came  in  sight  they 
opened  a  parley  with  the  Indian  allies  of  the 
French.  This  did  not  last  long,  for  they  could 
come  to  no  agreement,  and  without  further  delay 
the  savages  threw  themselves  into  the  fight  with 
wild  war-whoops. 

The  French  made  a  gallant  fight,  but  were  fa- 
tally hampered  by  their  unprotected  position.  For 
half  an  hour  they  made  sallies,  retreating  each  time 
after  heavy  losses,  but  led  back  for  another  assault 
by  those  who  survived  of  their  heroic  officers. 
At  last  their  ranks  were  completely  broken,  and 
they  fled  along  the  shore  to  regain  the  portage 
road  around  the  falls  and  escape  to  their  boats. 
For  five  miles  the  English  pursued  them  through 
the  woods,  capturing  and  bringing  back  as  many 
as  they  could  overtake.  The  bravery  of  the 
French  officers  and  the  desperate  efforts  that 
they  made  to  check  the  retreat  are  shown  by  the 
fact  that  nearly  all  of  them  were  either  killed  or  cap- 
tured. Their  followers  hastened  back  to  their  boats 
and  retreated  across  Lake  Erie,  burning,  on  their 
way,  Presque  Isle,  Le  Boeuf,  and  Venango,  and 
journeying  to  the  safe  and  distant  fort  of  Detroit. 

On  the  morning  of  July  24th,  Captain 
Pouchot,  shut  up  in  the  fort  at  Niagara,  heard 


no         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

the  sound  of  distant  firing  and  began  to  watch 
for  his  allies.  Through  the  open  spaces  of  the 
forest,  he  could  see  in  the  far  distance,  moving 
forms  and  groups  of  men  meeting  and  parting. 
The  English  had  evidently  gone  out  to  attack 
the  advancing  army ;  the  cannonading  from  the 
trenches  which  had  sounded  for  so  long  in  the 
ears  of  the  garrison  had  ceased,  and  the  trenches 
seemed  deserted.  Captain  Pouchot  called  for 
volunteers  to  sally  forth  from  the  fort  and  de- 
stroy the  English  works ;  but  as  soon  as  they 
appeared  the  English  soldiers  stationed  there  by 
Johnson  sprang  up  from  their  hiding  places  be- 
hind the  works  and  forced  the  French  to  retreat 
into  their  fortification. 

At  last  the  sound  of  distant  firing  stopped  and 
the  smoke  of  guns  ceased  to  rise  from  the  scene 
of  the  conflict.  The  garrison  waited  hour  after 
hour  in  anxious  suspense.  About  two  o'clock  in 
the  afternoon  a  friendly  Indian  slipped  through 
the  lines  and  told  of  the  utter  rout  of  the  relieving 
force.  Captain  Pouchot  refused  to  believe  him, 
but  at  four  o'clock,  after  a  sharp  cannonade  from 
the  English  had  been  answered  by  a  similar  dis- 
charge from  the  besieged  garrison,  a  trumpet  was 
sounded  in  the  English  trenches,  and  an  officer 


Niagara  and  the  Loss  of  Canada        in 

approached  the  fort  with  a  demand  for  its  sur- 
render. He  presented  also  a  paper  with  the 
names  of  the  captive  French  officers.  Captain 
Pouchot  still  refused  to  admit  to  the  enemy  his 
belief  in  the  disaster,  and  sent  an  officer  of  his 
own  to  see  the  prisoners.  His  worst  fears  were 
confirmed  when  the  officer  returned  with  the 
report  that  under  a  shelter  of  boughs  near  John- 
son's tent  were  sixteen  officers,  some  of  them 
severely  wounded. 

All  hope  for  the  French  was  gone,  and  Captain 
Pouchot  could  only  endeavor  to  arrange  for  his 
garrison  honorable  terms  of  surrender.  Such 
terms  the  English,  recognizing  the  gallant  con- 
duct of  their  enemies,  were  glad  to  grant.  The 
French  were  accorded  all  the  honors  of  prisoners 
of  war,  although  they  must  be  sent  under  guard 
to  New  York.  Pouchot  asked  and  was  granted 
a  special  stipulation  that  they  should  be  protected 
from  their  Indian  enemies,  who  might  take  this 
occasion  to  revenge  themselves  for  the  massacre 
at  Fort  William  Henry  three  years  before.  He 
signed  the  articles  of  surrender  and  delivered  over 
to  the  English  the  fort  with  ten  officers  and  four 
hundred  and  eighty-six  men,  besides  women  and 
children. 


H2          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

The  surrenderor  Niagara  broke  the  line  of  com- 
munication between  Montreal  and  the  interior. 
In  the  next  year,  1760,  the  Marquis  de  Vaudreuil 
signed  articles  of  capitulation  by  which  Canada 
and  all  its  dependencies  passed  into  the  hands  of 
the  English,  and  French  supremacy  on  the  Great 
Lakes  was  ended.  It  remained  only  for  the  con- 
querors to  take  possession  of  the  other  French 
posts  on  the  Great  Lakes. 


CHAPTER   X 

THE    CONSPIRACY    OF    PONTIAC 

ON  the  thirteenth  day  of  September,  1760, 
five  days  after  the  surrender  of  Montreal, 
Major  Robert  Rogers,  the  most  energetic 
Indian  fighter  of  the  time,  set  out  from  Montreal 
with  two  hundred  of  his  "Rangers,"  whose  ex- 
ploits in  war  had  made  his  name  famous,  for  the 
lakes.  He  was  to  take  possession  of  Detroit  and 
the  other  lake  forts  for  England.  Reaching  Niag- 
ara on  the  first  day  of  October,  they  crossed  by  por- 
tage to  the  site  of  the  modern  Buffalo  and  skirted 
the  southern  shore  of  Lake  Erie,  encamping 
nightly  on  its  margin  and  taking  every  precaution 
by  day  to  keep  the  boats  from  losing  sight  of  one 
another  on  the  rough,  stormy  waters.  One  night 
on  the  Cuyahoga  River,  near  where  the  present 
city  of  Cleveland  now  stands,  a  party  of  Indians 
entered  the  camp  and  announced  themselves  to 
be  ambassadors  from  Pontiac,  "  the  king  and  lord 
i  113 


H4          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

of  that  country,"  who  requested  them  to  halt 
until  he  himself  should  arrive.  In  a  few  hours 
the  great  sachem  stalked  into  camp.  He  was  of 
medium  height,  with  an  active,  muscular  figure, 
and  a  stern  face.  His  first  words  were  an  im- 
perious demand  as  to  Major  Rogers'  business. 
"  How  dare  you,"  said  he,  "  enter  my  country 
without  my  leave  ? "  "I  do  not  come  with 
any  design  against  you  or  your  people,"  replied 
Rogers,  "  but  to  remove  out  of  your  country  the 
French,  who  have  been  an  obstacle  in  our  way 
to  mutual  peace  and  commerce."  The  Indian 
who  greeted  Rogers  so  haughtily  was  the  prin- 
cipal chief  of  the  Ottawa  and  Ojibway  tribes, 
a  man  to  whom  all  the  nations  of  the  Illinois 
country  deferred  and  whose  name  was  held  in 
respect  even  by  the  distant  Algonquins  of  the 
St.  Lawrence.  Rogers  told  him  of  his  present 
mission,  taking  occasion  to  dwell  on  the  total 
defeat  of  the  French  in  Canada,  and  gave  him 
several  belts  of  wampum  in  token  of  his  friendly 
intent.  These  Pontiac  accepted  with  dignity,  but 
without  any  sign  of  unbending.  He  announced 
that  he  stood  in  the  path  the  English  travelled  in 
until  the  next  morning,  and  proffered  a  string  of 
wampum  to  intimate  that  they  must  not  march 


The  Conspiracy  of  Pontiac  115 

farther  without  his  leave.  He  inquired  whether 
the  party  was  in  need  of  anything  he  or  his 
warriors  could  supply,  and  then  withdrew. 

The  English  kept  a  double  force  on  guard  all 
night,  but  in  the  morning  Pontiac  came  with  his 
attendant  chiefs  and  declared  that  he  had  made 
peace  with  Rogers  and  his  detachment,  and  that 
they  might  therefore  pass  through  his  country 
unmolested  and  expel  the  French  garrison  from 
Detroit.  He  was  inclined,  he  said,  to  live  peace- 
ably with  the  English  while  they  used  him  as  he 
deserved,  but  if  they  treated  him  with  neglect,  he 
should  shut  up  the  way  and  exclude  them  from  his 
domains.  The  pipe  of  peace  was  passed  around 
the  council  fire  and  smoked  by  officers  and  chiefs 
alike. 

As  Rogers  and  his  men  proceeded  on  their 
way,  they  found  the  march  made  easy  by  the 
powerful  influence  of  Pontiac,  who  dissuaded  a 
war-party  of  Detroit  Indians  from  attacking 
them,  furnished  guides  and  welcome  supplies  of 
venison,  turkeys,  and  parched  corn.  He  even 
sent  word  ahead  to  the  Indians  within  the  limits 
of  the  fort  that  he  was  a  friend  of  the  English, 
making  it  impossible  for  the  French  commander 
to  get  any  help  from  them.  In  the  role  of 


n6         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

guide,  counsellor,  and  patronizing  friend  of  the 
newly  arrived  strangers,  this  remarkable  savage 
comes  for  the  first  time  into  prominence  in 
history.  Three  years  later  he  was  to  make  of 
what  would  have  been  without  his  leadership  a 
series  of  spasmodic  and  scattering  raids  a  formi- 
dable and  sustained  Indian  uprising  of  the  most 
serious  kind. 

Rogers  took  Detroit,  sent  the  French  com- 
mander and  his  garrison  down  to  Niagara,  dis- 
armed the  Canadian  militia,  and  received  the  oath 
of  allegiance  from  all  the  inhabitants ;  and  in  a 
few  hours  Detroit  was,  in  name  at  least,  an  Eng- 
lish town.  Within  a  year  all  the  posts  on  the 
lakes  came  into  English  possession ;  but  the 
English  were  far  from  gaining  the  hearty  support 
of  either  the  French-Canadian  inhabitants, — 
who  were  naturally  not  pleased  at  this  change  of 
hands,  —  or  even  of  the  Indian  tribes,  who  liked 
the  French. 

The  French  had  always  had  unusual  success  in 
dealing  with  the  Indians.  They  were  friendly 
with  them,  tolerant  of  their  presence,  and  generous 
with  their  gifts,  without  any  insulting  show  of 
patronage.  The  previous  reputation  of  the  Eng- 
lish was  bad  among  the  Indians.  They  resented 


The  Conspiracy  of  Pontiac  ny 

their  austere  manners,  their  steady  seizure  of 
forest  lands  for  agriculture,  and  their  ill-concealed 
contempt  for  the  red  man.  This  bad  name  had 
been  somewhat  obscured  in  these  recent  years  by 
the  excellent  prices  paid  by  the  English  for  furs, 
and  their  lavish  gifts  to  gain  Indian  support ;  but 
it  was  now  confirmed  at  every  post  along  the 
whole  frontier. 

When  the  two  rival  nations  were  using  the 
Indians  as  allies,  both  had  treated  them  with 
respect  and  endeavored  to  gain  their  friendship. 
Now  the  Indians  began  to  realize  that  this  friend- 
ship was  no  longer  considered  valuable,  but  that 
the  English  were  insolently  seizing  more  and 
more  of  their  domain  with  the  apparent  intention 
of  driving  them  out.  Their  chiefs  were  no  longer 
treated  with  respect  as  they  hung  about  the  white 
men's  forts.  Owing  to  a  sudden  policy  of  re- 
trenchment the  gifts,  too,  were  cut  down  or  with- 
held altogether,  until  the  savages  really  suffered 
from  want  of  supplies  which  the  wise  Frenchmen 
had  seen  the  necessity  of  providing  for  them. 
The  customary  amount  of  powder  was  denied 
them,  and  the  Indians  feared  lest  their  indepen- 
dence was  threatened.  The  English  fur  trade  was 
in  lawless  hands,  and  the  traders  abused  and  out- 


1 1 8          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

raged  the  Indians  while  they  cheated  them  out  of 
their  lawful  dues.  The  discontent  of  the  natives 
was  encouraged  and  fostered  by  the  French  traders 
and  settlers,  who  told  their  sullen  audiences  in- 
credible tales  of  the  further  evil  purposes  of  the 
English,  and  spread  far  and  wide  a  rumor  that 
the  armies  of  the  French  were  even  now  advanc- 
ing up  the  St.  Lawrence  and  Mississippi  rivers  to 
drive  out  these  pretenders. 

Suddenly,  in  May,  1763,  the  Indians  uprose. 
With  characteristic  secrecy  and  stealth  the  tribes 
had  exchanged  wampum  belts,  spreading  the  sum- 
mons to  war  and  signifying  in  return  acquiescence 
in  the  plan,  with  hardly  a  suspicion  on  the  part 
of  their  indifferent  English  neighbors.  Occa- 
sionally in  the  last  month  a  story  was  brought  in 
that  roused  the  anxiety  of  those  who  were  wise 
in  the  ways  of  the  Indians,  but  these  were  laughed 
to  scorn.  Looking  backward,  one  marvels  both 
at  the  secrecy  with  which  the  uprising  was  planned, 
and  at  the  serene  confidence  of  the  scanty  garri- 
sons stationed  at  these  isolated  and  dangerous  out- 
posts. From  contemporary  accounts  it  appears 
that  at  Presque  Isle  there  were  twenty-seven 
men ;  at  Michilimackinac  thirty-five  men  with 
their  officers ;  at  the  foot  of  Lake  Michigan,  on 


The  Conspiracy  of  Pontiac  119 

the  St.  Joseph's  River,  fifteen,  and  at  Fort  Miami 
ten,  while  the  other  posts  were  held  by  mere 
handfuls  of  soldiers  ;  Detroit  was  the  only  station 
that  was  suitably  manned. 

In  their  dealings  with  white  men,  the  Indians 
had  never  before  been  banded  together  under  a 
single  leader.  The  tribes  were  restless  and  jeal- 
ous of  one  another,  but  Pontiac  restrained  and 
humored  them.  He  made  his  plans  so  well,  and 
they  were  carried  out  so  secretly  and  energetically, 
that  within  ten  weeks  of  the  time  when  the  first 
blow  was  struck,  not  a  single  post  remained  in 
British  hands  west  of  Niagara,  save  only  the  fort 
of  Detroit,  where  he  himself  conducted  the  siege 
in  person. 

The  garrison  at  Detroit  was  commanded  by 
Major  Gladwin,  a  young  British  officer,  who  had 
taken  an  active  part  in  the  war  with  the  French, 
and  had  been  at  Detroit  for  nearly  a  year.  He 
had  eight  officers  and  one  hundred  and  twenty 
men  in  his  command ;  and  besides  the  Canadian 
residents,  whose  white  cottages  lined  either  bank 
of  the  river,  there  were  about  forty  fur  traders  at 
the  settlement.  The  original  stockade  had  been 
several  times  enlarged  since  Cadillac's  day,  once 
recently  during  the  three  years  of  English  occupa- 


I2O         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

tion.  It  contained  about  a  hundred  small  houses, 
a  well-built  group  of  barracks,  a  council  house, 
and  a  church.  Three  rows  of  pickets,  twenty-five 
feet  high,  with  large  gateways  surmounted  by 
blockhouses  for  observation  and  defence,  had 
taken  the  place  of  the  original  twelve-foot  fence. 
Within  each  gateway,  which  was  closed  at  sunset, 
was  a  small  wicket,  through  which  one  person 
could  enter  at  a  time.  This  was  kept  open  until 
nine  o'clock.  The  fort  was  protected  by  three 
small  cannon,  one  carrying  three-pound  balls, 
the  other  two  six-pounders;  but  these  guns  were 
badly  mounted  and  better  calculated  to  terrify  the 
Indians  than  to  render  much  actual  assistance. 
Far  more  effective  were  the  two  small  vessels, 
the  Beaver  and  the  Gladwin,  which  lay  anchored 
in  the  stream. 

At  a  council  on  the,  2yth  of  April,  1763,  Pon- 
tiac  inflamed  the  minds  of  his  hearers  by  reporting 
a  vision  vouchsafed  to  him  by  the  Great  Spirit, 
who  asked  him  why  the  Indians  suffered  these 
English,  —  "  these  dogs  dressed  in  red,"  —  to 
dwell  among  them.  The  first  step  of  his  plan, 
as  he  unfolded  it  to  his  warriors,  was  to  spy  out 
the  land.  On  May-day,  1760,  forty  men  of  the 
Ottawa  tribe,  purporting  to  have  returned  from 


The  Conspiracy  of  Pontiac  121 

their  winter  hunting-grounds,  went  to  the  fort  and 
asked  permission  to  dance  the  calumet  dance  be- 
fore the  English  officers.  They  were  admitted, 
and  while  thirty  of  them  danced,  the  remaining 
ten  strolled  about  and  noted  every  detail  of  the 
defence,  all  retiring  at  the  close  without  rousing 
any  suspicion  in  the  minds  of  their  hosts. 

Four  days  later  one  of  the  leading  French  set- 
tlers brought  in  word  that  his  wife,  while  pur- 
chasing supplies  in  the  Ottawa  village,  had  found 
the  warriors  filing  off  the  ends  of  their  gun-bar- 
rels so  as  to  make  them  only  about  a  yard  long, 
probably  with  some  treacherous  intent  of  conceal- 
ing them  more  easily.  The  next  day  Major 
Gladwin  was  informed  of  the  plot  for  the  destruc- 
tion of  his  garrison  on  the  morrow.  Two  stories 
are  told  of  the  source  of  this  information,  —  one  ;. 
that  an  Indian  girl  to  whom  he  had  been  kind 
made  it  known  to  him,  and  another  that  a  friendly 
young  warrior  told  him.  We  would  like  to  be- 
lieve the  former,  which  tells  of  the  reluctance  of 
the  beautiful  girl  to  depart  after  she  had  done  her 
errand  of  delivering  a  pair  of  embroidered  mocca- 
sins ordered  by  Major  Gladwin,  and  of  her  con- 
fession to  him,  when  he  pressed  her  for  the 
reason  of  her  sad  manner,  that  danger  threatened 


122         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

him  and  his  men.  Gladwin  hardly  believed  the 
story,  but  made  all  preparations  to  thwart  the 
plans  of  Pontiac  if  occasion  offered. 

The  next  morning  the  guards  in  the  block- 
house saw  Pontiac  and  sixty  men  land  from  their 
canoes  and  walk  in  Indian  file  up  the  river  road 
towards  the  gateway  of  the  stockade.  They  were 
admitted  and  escorted  to  the  council  chamber, 
where  Major  Gladwin  and  his  principal  officers 
were  awaiting  them.  It  is  said  that  even  the  iron 
composure  of  Pontiac  was  shaken  and  that  he 
gave  a  momentary  start  when  he  saw  drawn  up 
on  either  side  of  the  gateway  and  standing  about 
in  watchful  groups  in  the  streets  the  armed  sol- 
diers of  the  garrison.  The  officers,  too,  were  in 
full  uniform  with  their  swords  at  their  sides  and 
a  brace  of  pistols  in  their  belts.  Before  he  was 
seated  Pontiac  asked,  "  Why  do  I  see  so  many  of 
my  father's  young  men  standing  in  the  street  with 
their  guns  ?"  "  To  keep  them  in  good  discipline 
and  exercise  them,"  replied  Major  Gladwin, 
through  his  interpreter. 

When  the  Indians  were  seated  on  the  skins 
prepared  for  them,  Pontiac  began  his  address. 
Holding  in  his  hand  the  wampum  belt  which  had 
been  agreed  upon  as  the  signal  for  attack,  he 


The  Conspiracy  of  Pontiac  123 

spoke  of  the  friendship  of  the  Indians  for  the 
English.  Once,  it  is  said,  he  raised  it  as  if  to 
give  the  signal,  but  Gladwin  signed  with  his  hand 
and  the  soldiers  without  the  open  door  made  a 
clattering  with  their  arms.  Pontiac  trembled  and 
gave  the  belt  in  the  usual  way  instead  of  in  the 
manner  agreed  upon  in  the  council. 

Gladwin  replied  that  the  Indians  should  have 
the  friendship  of  the  English  just  so  long  as  they 
kept  the  peace,  but  not  one  moment  longer. 
Some  writers  say  that  he  drew  aside  the  blanket 
of  the  chief  nearest  to  him  and  showed  hidden 
in  its  folds  a  shortened  gun.  At  any  rate,  the 
English  found  out  that  every  chief  was  armed, 
and  knew  that  they  had  narrowly  escaped  a 
frightful  massacre.  The  Indians  were  awed  by 
the  sharp  rebuke  of  Gladwin  into  departing 
quietly.  For  two  days  they  attempted  to  parley 
with  the  English  and  gain  admittance  by  deceit ; 
but  Gladwin  was  firm  that  not  more  than  sixty 
might  enter  the  fort  at  one  time,  and  on  the  pth 
of  May  Pontiac  threw  aside  his  mask  of  pre- 
tended friendship.  Hostilities  were  begun  by  the 
Indians  murdering  an  old  English  sergeant  who 
lived  on  a  neighboring  island. 

The   Indians  moved  their  camp   to  the  same 


124         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

side  of  the  river  as  the  fort,  establishing  them- 
selves just  above  the  line  of  the  French  houses. 
One  more  attempt  was  made  for  peace,  when  two 
brave  English  officers,  Captain  Campbell  and 
Lieutenant  McDougall,  insisted  upon  risking 
their  lives  in  the  Indian  camp  to  see  if  they  could 
persuade  the  savages  to  desist  from  war.  Both 
were  detained  by  the  Indians  in  spite  of  the  pre- 
vious promises  of  Pontiac.  Lieutenant  Mc- 
Dougall later  made  his  escape,  but  Captain 
Campbell  was  murdered  by  the  natives  in  an  out- 
burst of  anger.  The  blockade  of  Detroit  was 
begun,  and  many  months  were  to  pass  before  a 
white  man  could  venture  in  daylight  to  step 
outside  the  little  wicket  or  to  show  his  head  at  a 
port-hole  or  window  without  fear  of  Indian  bullets. 
For  weeks  every  one  from  Major  Gladwin  down 
to  the  lowest  soldier  was  on  the  watch  night  and 
day,  no  man  lying  down  to  sleep  except  in  his 
clothes  and  with  his  gun  beside  him.  The  garri- 
son began  to  suffer  for  food  and  would  have  been 
forced  to  withdraw  from  the  fort  and  escape  down 
the  lake,  had  not  a  few  friendly  Canadians  smug- 
gled in  supplies.  The  Indians,  too,  whose  method 
of  warfare  is  that  of  sudden  attack  rather  than  of 
protracted  siege,  had  not  sufficient  food,  but 


The  Conspiracy  of  Pontiac  125 

began  to  make  raids  on  the  Canadian  families, 
who,  though  taking  no  part  in  the  struggle,  were 
in  general  indifferent  to  the  English.  At  a  time 
like  this  the  remarkable  gifts  of  Pontiac  came  out. 
With  a  foresight  and  method  most  unusual  in  a 
savage  he  established  a  base  of  supplies,  under- 
took a  systematic  levy  on  those  who  had  provi- 
sions, and  gave  out  a  regular  amount  each  day  to 
every  Indian. 

On  the  spth  of  May,  after  the  blockade  had 
been  going  on  for  three  weeks,  the  long-expected 
boats  from  Niagara,  which  had  been  summoned 
by  Major  Gladwin  in  the  first  days  of  the  siege, 
were  seen  rounding  the  wooded  point  below  the 
fort,  the  red  flag  of  England  flying  at  their  sterns. 
All  was  rejoicing  within  the  fort  until,  as  the 
boats  came  nearer,  the  English  saw  that  they  were 
occupied  and  guided  by  Indians.  Three  English- 
men who  escaped  to  the  fort  brought  a  mournful 
tale  of  a  night  attack  and  seizure  of  the  boats  at 
the  mouth  of  the  Detroit  River,  and  also  of  the 
destruction  of  Sandusky  and  Presque  Isle.  This 
was  the  first  of  many  reports  that  were  to  come 
during  that  month  of  similar  successful  attacks, 
until  the  little  garrison  at  Detroit  was  the  only 
one  left  on  the  upper  lakes.  The  remaining 


126         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

Englishmen  of  the  rescuing  party  were  massacred 
that  night  in  the  Indian  camp. 

Towards  the  end  of  June  Pontiac  sent  another 
summons  to  surrender,  saying  that  nine  hundred 
Indians  from  the  north  were  on  their  way  to  join 
him.  Major  Gladwin  refused  to  consider  terms 
till  Captain  Campbell  and  Lieutenant  McDougall 
were  returned  to  him,  and  once  more  hostilities 
were  resumed.  On  the  joth  of  June  the  Gladwin^ 
which  about  the  middle  of  May  had  eluded  the 
Indians  and  slipped  down  the  river  to  Niagara, 
succeeded  in  making  her  way  up  the  river  and  land- 
ing at  the  fort  a  force  of  fifty  men,  together  with 
much-needed  provisions  and  ammunition.  She 
brought  the  news  that  peace  had  been  formally 
concluded  between  England  and  France.  While 
many  of  the  French-Canadians  refused  to  admit 
the  truth  of  this  report  and  continued  to  romance 
to  the  Indians  about  large  French  armies  that 
were  approaching,  forty  settlers  accepted  their  new 
position  as  English  subjects  and  took  service  under 
Gladwin.  Through  them  the  English  officers  were 
kept  even  better  informed  of  what  went  on  with- 
out the  fort  than  before,  but  always  throughout 
the  blockade  there  seem  to  have  been  daily 
reports  from  some  source  of  what  happened  in 


The  Conspiracy  of  Pontiac  127 

the  Indian  camp,  as  well  as  frequent  sorties  from 
the  fort. 

During  the  month  of  July  the  efforts  of  the 
Indians  were  directed  particularly  against  the  two 
armed  vessels,  which  had  not  only  afforded  de- 
fence to  the  fort  and  brought  men  and  supplies, 
but  had  begun  to  make  trips  up  the  river  to  a 
point  opposite  the  Indian  camp,  from  which  they 
could  pour  shot  into  the  wigwams.  One  night 
the  attention  of  the  watchful  sentries  was  attracted 
by  a  mass  of  flames  shooting  up  into  the  sky 
in  the  general  direction  of  the  Indian  camp. 
Their  first  thought  was  that  the  village  was  on 
fire,  but  the  mass  of  flame  seemed  to  be  moving 
and  to  come  nearer.  A  huge  fire-float,  made  of 
four  bateaux1  filled  with  fagots,  birch  bark,  and 
tar,  appeared  on  the  water,  drifting  down  to  set 
fire  to  the  schooners  anchored  opposite  the  fort. 
The  vessels  were  anchored  by  two  cables,  and  as 
the  blazing  raft  approached,  they  slipped  one 
cable  and  swung  to  the  other  side  of  the  river 
while  the  raft  floated  harmlessly  by,  lighting  up 
the  fort  and  the  dark  shores  till  it  burned  itself 
down  to  the  water's  edge. 

1  Bateau,  the  French  word  for  boat,  usually  applied  to  a  flat-bottomed  boat 
with  pointed  ends. 


128          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

The  next  event  of  the  blockade  came  at  the 
end  of  that  month.  On  the  29th  of  July  the 
garrison  heard  firing  down  the  river.  They  waited 
anxiously,  wondering  what  new  disaster  was  to 
fall  upon  them,  for  similar  sounds  had  often  been 
followed  by  the  arrival  of  a  single  survivor  from 
some  abandoned  fort  with  a  tale  of  Indian  butch- 
ery. Half  an  hour  later  the  sentries  called  to 
their  officers  to  come  quickly,  for  the  whole  sur- 
face of  the  water  was  covered  with  boats.  In 
breathless  suspense  the  weary  garrison  waited  to 
see  if  the  story  of  two  months  before  was  to  be 
repeated  and  dusky  forms  were  to  appear  crouch- 
ing in  captured  English  vessels ;  but  they  were  re- 
assured by  the  salute  of  an  English  gun.  In  an 
hour  two  hundred  and  sixty  men  had  landed 
at  the  little  wharf  and  been  welcomed  with  cheers 
and  shouts.  Captain  Dalyell  had  been  sent  from 
Niagara  with  companies  from  two  regiments  and 
with  twenty  of  Rogers'  Rangers,  commanded  by 
Major  Rogers  himself,  to  put  an  end  to  the  siege. 

The  newcomers  were  eager  to  sally  forth  and 
meet  the  Indians.  Gladwin,  who  had  been  made 
wary  by  long  months  of  experience  with  Pontiac, 
strenuously  opposed  Dalyell's  plan  of  a  night 
attack,  and  only  gave  his  consent  when  the  latter 


The  Conspiracy  of  Pontiac  129 

threatened  to  leave  Detroit  unless  some  such  bold 
stroke  was  permitted.  About  two  o'clock  in  the 
morning,  on  the  thirty-first  day  of  July,  two  hun- 
dred and  fifty  men  marched  in  three  detachments 
up  the  bank  of  the  river,  past  the  French  cottages, 
to  a  little  stream  a  mile  and  a  half  above  the  fort. 
Treacherous  Canadians,  who  had  in  some  way 
learned  of  the  plan,  had  warned  the  Indians,  and 
as  the  advance  guard  passed  across  the  bridge 
which  spanned  the  stream,  the  Indians  dashed 
down  from  the  heights  above  and  poured  volleys 
of  musketry  into  the  English  ranks.  The  sol- 
diers recoiled  for  a  moment;  then  they  pushed  on 
over  the  bridge,  but  the  savages  vanished  yelling 
into  the  darkness  beyond.  For  a  time  the  Eng- 
lish pressed  on,  shot  at  from  every  side ;  but  flesh 
and  blood  could  not  stand  against  this  invisible 
enemy.  The  remaining  troops  endeavored  to 
retreat  in  orderly  fashion,  but  were  soon  under 
heavy  fire  again  from  a  rear  ambuscade  of  Indians. 
Major  Rogers  gained  entrance  to  a  house  on  the 
road  and  from  its  windows  commanded  the  road 
with  his  guns  and  covered  the  retreat.  The  two 
bateaux  which  had  followed  the  party  up  the 
river  were  loaded  with  the  dead  and  wounded. 
Slowly  the  English  made  their  way  back  under 


130         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

constant  fire,  and  by  eight  o'clock  the  survivors 
gained  the  shelter  of  the  fort.  Of  the  two  hun- 
dred and  fifty  who  had  gone  out  six  hours  before, 
one  hundred  and  fifty-nine  had  been  killed  or 
wounded,  and  Captain  Dalyell  himself  had  lost 
his  life.  The  victory  of  Bloody  Run,  as  the 
stream  was  ever  afterwards  called,  restored  the 
confidence  of  Pontiac  and  brought  many  acces- 
sions to  his  side;  but  in  spite  of  this  disaster 
Major  Gladwin,  with  his  reenforced  garrison  of 
over  two  hundred  able-bodied  men,  was  confident 
of  ultimate  success. 

The  schooner  Gladwin  made  her  way  again 
to  Niagara  and  returned  early  in  September  with 
a  welcome  load  of  forty-seven  barrels  of  flour  and 
one  hundred  barrels  of  pork,  but  with  a  tale  of 
Indian  attack  and  the  loss  of  six  of  her  crew  of 
twelve.  Other  attempts  from  Niagara  to  relieve 
the  garrison  were  unsuccessful,  but  Pontiac  re- 
ceived in  October  a  heavy  blow  in  a  letter  from 
the  French  commander  at  Fort  Chartres  in  the 
Illinois  country,  saying  that  not  only  could  he 
offer  Pontiac  no  help  but  he  was  now  at  peace 
with  the  English  and  wished  the  Indians  to  follow 
his  example.  This  message  had  its  effect.  Pon- 
tiac had  had  great  hopes  of  French  assistance. 


The  Conspiracy  of  Pontiac  131 

With  these  hopes  dashed  he  knew  he  could  not 
hold  out  much  longer ;  already  his  warriors  were 
wearying  of  the  attack  and  deserting  him.  He 
sent  a  letter  to  Gladwin  asking  for  peace  and 
agreeing  to  forget  the  "bad  things  that  had  hap- 
pened," if  the  Englishman  would  do  the  same. 
Gladwin  replied  that  he  would  grant  a  truce  while 
he  sent  Pontiac's  message  to  his  general,  who 
alone  had  power  to  grant  pardon. 

As  it  was  then  late  in  the  season,  it  was  deemed 
best  to  leave  matters  in  this  condition  until  spring, 
as  it  held  the  Indians  in  a  wholesome  state  of  un- 
certainty. Within  a  few  days  the  encampments 
in  the  vicinity  of  Detroit  were  abandoned.  After 
a  confinement  of  five  long  months  the  inhabitants 
of  the  town  could  venture  outside  the  stockade 
without  dread  of  Indian  bullets. 

A  report  was  sent  to  General  Amherst,  the 
commander  of  the  British  army,  and  during  the 
winter  plans  were  made  to  relieve  Detroit  and 
bring  peace  to  the  lake  region.  A  military  expe- 
dition was  to  be  sent  in  the  spring  to  force  the 
tribes  into  submission  ;  and  in  the  meantime 
Sir  William  Johnson,  the  superintendent  of  In- 
dian affairs,  despatched  messages  to  all  the  tribes, 
warning  them  of  the  coming  expedition  and 


The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

urging  those  who  were  ready  to  make  peace  to 
come,  while  there  was  yet  time,  to  a  grand  council 
fire  at  Niagara. 

From  the  St.  Lawrence  and  the  Mississippi, 
from  Lake  Superior  and  eastern  New  York,  the 
friendly  tribes  came  up  in  July  to  Niagara.  When 
Johnson  stepped  ashore  from  the  boat  which 
brought  him  from  Oswego,  he  saw  dotting  the 
fields  the  wigwams  of  more  than  a  thousand 
Indians,  and  in  a  few  days  the  number  was 
doubled.  Councils  were  held  at  which  the  rep- 
resentatives of  the  tribes  promised  their  friend- 
ship to  the  English,  agreed  to  restore  the  forts, 
to  cede  lands,  and  in  so  far  as  their  own  nations 
were  concerned  to  guarantee  safe  navigation  on 
the  lakes.  This  convention  was  the  most  remark- 
able assemblage  of  Indians  that  had  ever  gathered 
on  the  shores  of  the  Great  Lakes. 

While  the  council  was  in  progress  Colonel 
Bradstreet  arrived  at  Niagara  with  his  troops, 
and  when  it  was  over  he  proceeded  up  Lake  Erie 
to  Detroit,  for  Pontiac  and  his  tribes  had  not 
come  to  the  conference,  and  Detroit  was  still  in 
danger.  During  the  winter  the  Indians  had  left 
the  town  in  peace,  but  in  the  spring  warriors  had 
returned  to  encamp  on  the  strait  and  had  made 


he  Conspiracy  of  Pontiac  133 


occasional  attacks.  In  August,  1764,  fifteen 
months  from  the  time  when  Pontiac  and  his  sixty 
chiefs  sat  in  Gladwin's  council  chamber,  the 
English  army  under  General  Bradstreet  came  to 
relieve  the  weary  garrison.  Pontiac  sent  a  mes- 
sage of  defiance  to  the  English  chief,  but  he  sent 
it  from  the  safe  distance  of  a  village  on  the 
Maumee  River,  forty  or  fifty  miles  away,  in  what 
is  now  the  state  of  Ohio. 

Fresh  troops  were  put  in  place  of  the  worn- 
out  veterans  of  the  siege  ;  such  Indians  as  re- 
mained in  the  vicinity  came  in  and  offered  their 
allegiance  to  the  English  ;  and  Gladwin,  weary  of 
fighting  the  Indians,  started  down  Lake  Erie  on  his 
way  to  England.  Now  that  his  defence  of  Detroit 
was  honorably  ended,  he  was  glad  to  resign  his 
commission.  Lesser  posts  had  fallen,  but  Detroit 
had  been  saved,  and  with  it  the  upper  lakes. 

Pontiac  spent  the  next  two  years  among  the 
western  tribes  of  the  Illinois  region.  In  the  sum- 
mer of  1766  he  went  to  Oswego,  and  as  official 
representative  of  the  tribes  of  the  West  offered 
to  Sir  William  Johnson  his  friendship  and  theirs. 
His  conspiracy  had  failed  and  he  returned  sadly 
to  his  home  in  the  Illinois  villages.  For  two 
years  little  is  known  of  him,  but  in  April,  1769, 


134         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

his  name  became  once  more  the  watchword  of 
bloodshed  and  slaughter.  From  tribe  to  tribe 
runners  carried  the  news  that  he  had  been  mur- 
dered in  an  Indian  village,  and  the  nations  rose  in 
their  wrath  to  avenge  the  death  of  their  great 
chieftain.  The  Illinois  nation,  to  which  the  assas- 
sin belonged,  was  almost  wiped  out,  andjnternal 
feuds  sprang  up  between  the  tribes  till  all  the 
Indians  of  the  southern  lake  region  were  involved, 
and  the  death  of  Pontiac  was  avenged  among  his 
people  by  a  period  of  universal  tribal  war. 

Chronology  of  the  Ending  of  French  Rule 

1759.  Capture  of  Quebec  and  Niagara. 

1760.  Capture  of  Montreal  and  surrender  of  Canada. 
Taking  possession  of  Detroit. 

1763.  Pontiac' s  attack,  and  the  fall  of  the  other  posts  of  the 

western  lakes. 
Treaty  of  Peace. 

1764.  Sir  William  Johnson's  conference  at  Niagara. 
Bradstreet's  expedition  up  Lake  Erie,  and  the  close  of 

the  blockade  of  Detroit. 


CHAPTER   XI 

THE    ADVENTURES    OF    A    TRADER 

A  FUR  TRADER  by  the  name  of  Alex- 
ander Henry  was  the  first  Englishman 
to  reach  Mackinac  after  the  fall  of  New 
France.  His  story  of  his  adventures  gives  a 
graphic  picture  of  the  course  of  events  on  the 
upper  lakes  during  the  years  when  the  siege  of 
Detroit  and  the  Indian  uprising  under  Pontiac 
left  the  northern  forts  isolated  and  unprotected. 
Henry  reached  Fort  Mackinac  in  September, 
1761.  For  the  latter  part  of  his  journey  from 
Montreal  he  had  adopted  the  disguise  of  a  French 
trader,  for  the  Indians  stopped  every  party  to 
inquire  whether  any  Englishman  was  coming  to 
the  lakes.  As  soon  as  his  nationality  became 
known  at  Mackinac  he  was  warned  by  the  Cana- 
dians that  he  should  lose  no  time  in  making  his 
escape  to  Detroit,  as  the  Indians  would  not  tol- 
erate the  presence  of  an  Englishman.  Henry 
suspected  that  the  Canadians  had  fostered  this 

'35 


136         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

spirit  to  retain  control  of  the  fur  trade,  and  were 
exaggerating  the  dangers  of  his  position  in  the 
hope  of  frightening  him  away.  Still,  it  did  not 
add  to  his  comfort  to  hear  that  a  party  of  Indians 
was  coming  to  pay  him  a  visit.  As  he  sat  in  his 
house  one  afternoon  the  door  opened  and  an 
Indian  chief,  six  feet  tall,  walked  quietly  in.  Be- 
hind him  were  sixty  more,  each  with  a  tomahawk 
in  one  hand  and  a  scalping  knife  in  the  other. 
In  absolute  silence  they  stalked  into  the  room  in 
single  file,  seated  themselves,  at  a  sign  from  their 
leader,  on  the  floor,  and  began  to  smoke  their 
pipes.  In  the  long  pause  that  followed  Henry 
had  time  to  study  his  formidable  visitors.  Their 
faces  were  painted  with  charcoal  mixed  with  grease, 
and  their  bodies,  bare  to  the  waist,  were  decorated 
with  white  clay  plastered  on  in  various  patterns. 
Some  had  feathers  thrust  through  their  noses ; 
others  had  them  stuck  into  their  hair.  Unless 
their  purpose  was  friendly  these  warriors  would 
not  be  safe  guests  for  a  single  trader  to  entertain. 
After  a  long  time  the  chief  began  to  address  him. 
He  told  him  that  because  of  his  bravery  in  ven- 
turing into  this  country  alone  he  might  stay 
among  them,  in  spite  of  his  being  ah  English- 
man, the  hated  enemy  of  their  father,  the  king  of 


The  Adventures  of  a  Trader  137 

France.  The  august  assembly  ended  with  a 
request  that  the  young  men  be  allowed  to  taste 
his  "  English  milk,"  meaning  rum,  and  the  trader 
was  assured  of  his  safety  at  Mackinac. 

That  week  a  detachment  of  English  troops 
arrived  from  the  lower  lakes,  and  the  trader's 
protection  was  ensured.  Henry  fitted  out  expedi- 
tions to  go  into  the  interior  to  buy  furs  of  the 
more  remote  Indian  tribes,  and  prepared  to  spend 
the  winter  at  the  fort.  During  these  months  at 
Mackinac  and  the  succeeding  winter  which  he 
spent  at  Sault  Ste.  Marie  he  was  much  interested 
in  the  fisheries.  In  both  these  straits  the  white- 
fish  were  very  abundant.  At  Sault  Ste.  Marie  in 
the  late  autumn  there  was  such  a  run  of  fish  that 
two  men  would  go  out  in  a  canoe,  one  paddling 
and  the  other  handling  a  scoop-net  on  the  end  of 
a  ten-foot  pole,  and  would  return  in  two  hours 
with  a  catch  of  five  hundred  whitefish,  each 
weighing  from  six  to  fifteen  pounds.  The  steers- 
man would  guide  the  canoe  in  and  out  between 
the  sharp  rocks  and  rushing  rapids  ;  the  fisher- 
man would  dip  his  net  and  throw  in  a  pile  of  fish  ; 
and  before  long  the  canoe  would  be  loaded  down 
to  the  water's  edge.  During  the  winter  the  fish 
were  cured  by  drying  them  in  smoke,  and  packed 


138          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

for   transportation  to  the   nearest  frontier   posts, 
and  even  for  the  markets  of  the  St.  Lawrence. 

In  May,  1763,  when  Henry  returned  to 
Mackinac,  he  found  that  the  traders,  who  were 
gathering  there,  brought  rumors  of  Indian  hostility. 
These  reports  were  disregarded  by  the  officers  of 
the  garrison,  who  with  their  force  of  soldiers  and 
their  fort  could  not  believe  there  was  any  cause 
for  alarm.  Henry  himself  received  a  warning. 
The  year  before,  he  had  won  the  friendship  of 
one  of  the  Chippewa  Indians,  named  Wawatam, 
who  had  surprised  him  one  day  by  bringing  his 
whole  family  to  the  trader's  house,  offering  a 
present  of  skins,  sugar,  and  dried  meat,  and  de- 
claring his  wish  of  adopting  him  into  his  family 
as  a  brother.  Henry  had  accepted  the  honor  and 
thought  no  more  of  the  incident  until  now,  in  the 
spring  of  1763,  his  Indian  brother  came  to  his 
house  in  a  very  sober  mood,  and  begged  him  to 
go  back  to  the  Sault  the  next  morning  with  him- 
self and  his  family.  He  further  inquired  whether 
the  commandant  of  the  fort  had  not  heard  bad 
news,  saying  that  he  himself  had  been  frequently 
disturbed  by  "the  noise  of  evil  birds."  He 
hinted  that  there  were  many  more  Indians  about 
the  fort  than  the  English  had  seen.  Henry  paid 


The  Adventures  of  a  Trader  139 

little  attention  to  the  Indian's  words,  but  the 
next  morning  he  returned  with  his  wife  and  once 
more  entreated  the  trader  to  go  with  him.  Henry 
was  not  sufficiently  familiar  with  the  Chippewa 
language  to  follow  all  his  figurative  and  elaborate 
speech,  and  unfortunately  turned  a  deaf  ear  to  his 
plea.  After  long  effort  the  chief  went  sadly  away. 
He  had  warned  Henry  that  all  the  Indians  were 
coming  in  a  body  one  day  soon  to  demand  liquor 
of  the  commandant,  and  that  before  they  became 
intoxicated  he  had  better  be  gone.  Henry  kept 
careful  watch,  but  except  that  a  great  many 
Indians  came  in  the  next  day  to  purchase  toma- 
hawks, he  saw  nothing  unusual.  The  next  day, 
the  4th  of  June,  was  the  king's  birthday,  and 
from  this  time  on  we  will  let  Henry  tell  his  own 
story. 

"  The  morning  was  sultry.  A  Chippewa  came 
to  tell  me  that  his  nation  was  going  to  play  at 
baggatiway  (called  by  the  Canadians  "  la  crosse  ") 
with  the  Sacs,  another  Indian  nation.  He  invited 
me  to  witness  the  sport,  adding  that  the  comman- 
dant was  to  be  there,  and  would  bet  on  the  side  of 
the  Chippewas.  In  consequence  of  this  informa- 
tion, I  went  to  the  commandant  and  expostulated 
with  him  a  little,  representing  that  the  Indians 


140         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

might  possibly  have  some  sinister  end  in  view  ; 
but  he  only  smiled  at  my  suspicions. 

"  I  did  not  go  myself  to  see  the  match,  which 
was  now  to  be  played  without  the  fort,  because, 
there  being  a  canoe  prepared  to  depart  on  the 
following  day  for  Montreal,  I  employed  myself 
in  writing  letters  to  my  friends ;  and  even  when  a 
fellow- trader,  Mr.  Tracy,  happened  to  call  upon 
me,  saying  that  another  canoe  had  just  arrived 
from  Detroit,  and  proposing  that  I  should  go 
with  him  to  the  beach  to  inquire  the  news,  it  so 
happened  that  I  still  remained  to  finish  my 
letters,  promising  to  follow  Mr.  Tracy  in  the 
course  of  a  few  minutes.  Mr.  Tracy  had  not 
gone  more  than  twenty  paces  from  my  door, 
when  I  heard  an  Indian  war-cry,  and  a  noise 
of  general  confusion. 

"  Going  instantly  to  my  window,  I  saw  a  crowd 
of  Indians,  within  the  fort,  furiously  cutting  down 
and  scalping  every  Englishman  they  found.  I 
had,  in  the  room  in  which  I  was,  a  fowling-piece, 
loaded  with  shot.  This  I  immediately  seized, 
and  held  it  for  a  few  minutes,  waiting  to  hear  the 
drum  beat  to  arms.  In  this  dreadful  interval,  I 
saw  several  of  my  countrymen  fall." 

At  length,  realizing  that  there  was  no  hope  of 


The  Adventures  of  a  Trader  141 

a  call  to  arms,  and  that  one  person  could  do 
nothing  against  four  hundred  Indians,  Henry 
decided  to  seek  shelter  for  himself.  He  saw  that 
many  of  the  Canadian  inhabitants  of  the  fort  were 
calmly  looking  on,  neither  helping  nor  hindering 
the  Indians,  and  conceived  the  hope  that  he 
might  be  safe  in  one  of  their  houses.  He  climbed 
the  low  fence  that  separated  his  house  from  that 
of  Mr.  Langlade,  his  next  neighbor,  and  found 
the  whole  family  at  the  windows,  gazing  at  the 
scene  of  blood  before  them.  Henry  begged  Mr. 
Langlade  to  put  him  in  some  place  of  safety,  but 
he  paid  no  attention.  "  This/'  says  Henry,  cc  was 
a  moment  for  despair;  but  the  next  an  Indian 
woman,  a  slave  of  Mr.  Langlade's,  beckoned  to 
me  to  follow  her.  She  brought  me  to  a  door, 
which  she  opened,  desiring  me  to  enter,  and  tell- 
ing me  that  it  led  to  the  garret,  where  I  must  go 
and  conceal  myself."  The  woman  locked  the 
door  after  him,  and  from  his  hiding-place  he 
looked  out  on  the  horrible  scenes  that  were  pass- 
ing without.  Soon  every  one  who  could  be 
found  had  been  massacred,  and  there  was  a  gen- 
eral cry,  "  All  is  finished."  At  the  same  instant 
Indians  entered  the  house  and  asked  Mr.  Lang- 
lade whether  there  were  any  Englishmen  in  the 


142         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

house.  The  Canadian  replied  that  he  did  not 
know  of  any,  —  for  the  Indian  woman  had  kept 
her  secret,  —  but  that  they  might  hunt  for  them- 
selves. They  were  delayed  in  their  search  by  a 
hunt  for  the  key  of  the  garret  door,  and  in  those 
few  moments  Henry  hid  himself  under  a  pile  of 
birchbark  vessels.  Four  Indians  came  up  with 
Mr.  Langlade,  walked  round  the  dark  garret  so 
near  to  the  fugitive  that  they  might  have  touched 
him,  told  how  many  they  had  killed  and  how 
many  scalps  they  had  taken,  and  went  off  again, 
locking  the  door  after  them. 

Exhausted  by  suspense  Henry  fell  asleep,  and 
was  awakened  in  the  evening  by  Mrs.  Langlade, 
who  came  up  to  the  garret  and  was  much  sur- 
prised to  find  him  there.  She  gave  him  a  little 
water  to  drink  and  told  him  she  hoped  he  would 
escape.  The  next  morning  the  Indians  returned, 
and  discovered  the  trader's  hiding-place.  An 
Indian  walked  into  the  garret  and  seized  him 
with  one  hand  by  the  collar  of  his  coat,  while 
in  the  other  he  brandished  a  large  carving-knife 
as  if  he  meant  to  plunge  it  into  him.  For  some 
seconds  the  Indian  looked  into  Henry's  eyes,  and 
then  dropped  his  arm,  saying,  "  I  won't  kill 
you!"  He  added  that  he  had  once  lost  a  brother, 


The  Adventures  of  a  Trader  143 

and  that  he  would  call  his  prisoner  after  him. 
He  was  going  to  take  him  to  his  cabin,  but 
Henry  begged  Mr.  Langlade  to  request  that  he 
be  allowed  to  stay  in  the  garret,  as  the  Indians 
were  so  intoxicated  that  no  Englishman  would  be 
safe  among  them.  Once  more  the  trader  settled 
himself  in  the  garret  to  await  his  fate,  but  in  an 
hour  an  Indian  came,  purporting  to  be  from  his 
new  master,  and  led  him  outside  the  fort  among 
the  bushes,  where  he  tried  to  murder  him. 
Henry  managed  to  escape  and  ran  with  all  speed 
to  the  fort,  where  he  found  his  master,  who  gave 
him  protection.  The  next  morning  three  other 
Englishmen  who  had  escaped  massacre  were 
brought  to  Mr.  Langlade's  house.  From  them 
Henry  learned  that  the  game  of  "  la  crosse  "  had 
been  a  device  to  get  as  many  Englishmen  as 
possible  outside  the  walls.  It  had  been  agreed 
that  a  ball  should  be  tossed  as  if  by  accident  over 
the  pickets  of  the  fort,  and  that  it  should  be 
instantly  followed  by  all  engaged  in  the  game. 
When  a  sufficient  number  were  inside  they  could 
seize  the  fort.  Twenty  Englishmen  had  sur- 
vived the  massacre.  They  consulted  together 
to  see  whether  there  was  any  hope  of  their  regain- 
ing possession  of  the  station,  but  were  forced  to 


144         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

decide  that  without  the  help  of  the  Canadian 
inhabitants,  who  could  not  be  counted  upon,  it 
was  impossible. 

The  next  day  the  prisoners  went  through  a 
strange  experience.  They  were  put  into  canoes 
and  told  that  they  were  to  be  taken  to  the  Castor 
Islands  in  Lake  Michigan,  but  a  thick  fog  came 
up  and  their  guards  thought  it  safer  to  keep  near 
shore  and  paddled  towards  an  Ottawa  village. 
Every  half  hour  the  Indians  gave  their  war- 
whoops,  one  for  every  prisoner  in  the  canoe,  in 
order  to  notify  all  other  Indians  of  the  number 
of  prisoners  they  were  taking.  At  the  Ottawa 
village  they  were  greeted  by  an  Ottawa  chief,  who 
made  signs  to  them  to  land.  When  they  came 
within  a  few  hundred  yards  of  the  shore  warriors 
rushed  into  the  water,  dragged  the  prisoners  from 
the  canoes,  and  carried  them  ashore.  The  Eng- 
lish thought  that  their  last  moments  had  come, 
but  the  Ottawas  hastened  to  assure  them  that  they 
were  their  friends.  The  Ottawas  were  indignant 
because  they  had  not  been  consulted  by  the 
Chippewas  about  destroying  the  English.  There- 
fore they  had  rescued  the  prisoners  from  the 
Chippewas,  who  were  taking  them  to  the  Castor 
Islands  to  kill  them.  Before  long  the  bewildered 


The  Adventures  of  a  Trader          145 

prisoners  were  returning  to  Mackinac  in  the 
canoes  of  the  Ottawas,  and  were  marched  by  their 
new  masters  into  the  midst  of  the  astonished 
Chippewas. 

While  their  captives  slept  the  two  nations  held 
a  long  conference,  and  the  Ottawas  were  unfor- 
tunately persuaded  to  relinquish  their  grievance 
and  return  the  prisoners  to  their  former  con- 
querors. The  prospect  for  the  Englishmen  was 
now  dark  indeed,  and  several  of  them  were  to 
lose  their  lives  that  day;  but  as  preparations 
were  being  made  for  the  slaughter,  Wawatam, 
Henry's  adopted  brother,  walked  into  the  coun- 
cil. By  presents  he  bought  the  trader,  —  all  the 
Indians  recognizing  his  right  to  do  so,  —  and 
took  him  away  with  him  into  the  interior.  There 
Henry  spent  the  winter  hunting  with  the  Indians. 
He  was  often  in  danger  from  hostile  tribes  who 
brought  tales  of  the  siege  of  Detroit  and  sum- 
mons from  Pontiac  to  help  in  the  war,  but  his 
position  in  the  family  of  Wawatam  protected 
him,  and  in  the  spring  of  1764  he  returned  with 
a  party  of  Canadian  traders  to  Sault  Ste.  Marie. 

While  Henry  was  at  the  Sault  a  canoe  arrived 
one  day  from  Niagara.  A  council  was  assembled 
to  meet  the  strangers  and  receive  their  message. 


146          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

They  proved  to  be  the  ambassadors  of  Sir  Will- 
iam Johnson,  who  warned  the  tribes  of  the  great 
English  army  that  was  coming,  and  advised  them 
to  hasten  to  Niagara  to  make  peace.  Such  a 
weighty  matter  could  not  be  settled  by  mere 
human  knowledge  and  wisdom  ;  so  the  Indians 
made  solemn  preparations  to  consult  their  guid- 
ing spirit,  the  "  Great  Turtle." 

They  built  a  large  wigwam,  within  which  they 
placed  a  small  moose-skin  tent  for  the  use  of  the 
priest.  At  nightfall  the  whole  village  assembled 
in  the  wigwam.  Several  fires  had  been  kindled 
near  the  tent,  and  their  flames  lighted  up  the 
expectant  faces  of  this  strange  assemblage.  The 
priest  entered  the  tent,  and  as  the  skins  fell  over 
him  many  voices  were  heard.  Some  were  barking 
like  dogs,  some  howled  like  wolves,  and  others 
sobbed  as  if  in  pain.  After  a  time  these  frightful 
sounds  died  away,  and  a  perfect  silence  followed. 
Then  a  voice  not  heard  before  seemed  to  show 
the  arrival  of  a  new  character  in  the  tent.  Henry 
describes  this  as  "a  low  feeble  voice,  resembling 
the  cry  of  a  young  puppy."  When  it  was  heard 
the  Indians  clapped  their  hands  for  joy,  for  now 
the  chief  spirit,  the  "  Turtle,"  the  spirit  that 
never  lied,  had  come  to  them.  The  others  had 


The  Adventures  of  a  Trader  147 

been  evil  and  lying  voices.  For  half  an  hour 
sounds  of  conversation  were  heard  from  the  tent, 
and  then  the  priest  spoke,  saying  that  the  "  Great 
Turtle  "  was  come  and  would  answer  such  ques- 
tions as  should  be  asked.  The  chief  of  the 
village  desired  the  priest  to  inquire  whether  the 
English  were  preparing  to  make  war  on  the 
Indians,  and  whether  there  were  at  Fort  Niagara 
large  numbers  of  English  troops.  When  the 
priest  put  these  questions  the  tent  began  to  shake 
violently,  and  soon  a  voice  announced  that  the 
"Turtle"  had  departed. 

A  quarter  of  an  hour  elapsed  in  silence,  and 
then  the  voice  of  the  "  Turtle  "  was  heard  again. 
After  it  had  talked  for  some  time  in  a  language 
unintelligible  to  the  audience,  the  priest  gave  an 
interpretation  of  what  it  had  said.  The  spirit  had, 
during  its  short  absence,  crossed  Lake  Huron, 
been  to  Fort  Niagara,  and  thence  to  Montreal. 
At  Fort  Niagara  he  had  seen  no  great  number 
of  soldiers,  but  on  the  St.  Lawrence  he  had 
found  the  river  covered  with  boats,  and  the 
boats  filled  with  soldiers,  "  in  number  like  the 
leaves  of  the  trees,"  and  these  were  coming  to 
make  war  on  the  Indians.  The  chief  had  a  third 
question  to  ask,  and  the  spirit,  "  without  a  fresh 


148          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

journey  to  Niagara,"  gave  an  immediate  and 
most  satisfactory  answer.  "  If,"  said  the  chief, 
"the  Indians  visit  Sir  William  Johnson,  will 
they  be  received  as  friends  ?  "  "  Sir  William 
Johnson,"  said  the  spirit,  "will  fill  their  canoes 
with  presents  ;  with  blankets,  kettles,  guns,  gun- 
powder and  shot,  and  large  barrels  of  rum,  such 
as  the  stoutest  of  the  Indians  will  not  be  able  to 
lift;  and  every  man  will  return  in  safety  to  his 
family." 

"  At  this,"  writes  Henry,  "  the  transport  was 
universal;  and  amid  the  clapping  of  hands,  a 
hundred  voices  exclaimed,  '  I  will  go,  too !  I 
will  go,  too  ! '  " 

On  the  loth  of  June,  Henry  embarked  with 
the  Indian  deputation  of  sixteen  men,  leaving 
the  scene  of  his  long  captivity.  The  party  went 
down  Georgian  Bay,  across  the  country  where 
the  great  Huron  missions  had  been  built  to  Lake 
Simcoe,  and  out  past  the  site  of  Toronto  to  Lake 
Ontario.  There  they  built  canoes  to  take  the 
place  of  those  they  had  left  on  Georgian  Bay, 
completing  two  large  boats  in  two  days.  They 
spent  their  last  night  encamped  four  miles  from 
Fort  Niagara.  In  the  morning  the  Indians 
feared  to  start  lest  they  should  be  going  into  a 


The  Adventures  of  a  Trader  149 

trap  set  by  the  English.  Henry  assured  them 
of  a  friendly  welcome,  and  at  length,  after  paint- 
ing themselves  in  their  gayest  colors  to  show 
their  peaceable  intent,  and  singing  the  song 
which  they  used  on  going  into  danger,  they  em- 
barked. "  A  few  minutes  after,"  says  Henry, 
"  I  crossed  to  the  fort ;  and  here  I  was  received 
by  Sir  William  Johnson,  in  a  manner  for  which 
I  have  ever  been  gratefully  attached  to  his  person 
and  memory." 

The  Indians  joined  in  the  great  council,  and 
Henry  conferred  with  General  Bradstreet,  who 
with  three  thousand  men  was  preparing  to  go  up 
Lake  Erie  and  raise  the  siege  of  Detroit.  Brad- 
street  informed  him  that  it  was  his  plan  when  he 
reached  Detroit  to  send  a  body  of  troops  to 
Mackinac,  and  that  they  should  assist  the  trader 
to  recover  his  property  there,  should  he  care  to 
accompany  them.  Henry  was  given  command 
of  a  corps  of  Indians  of  the  upper  lakes,  ninety- 
six  in  number,  who  were  to  proceed  with  the 
army.  Among  them  were  the  sixteen  men  with 
whom  he  had  come  to  Niagara.  Henry  com- 
ments on  the  reversal  of  conditions  which  made 
him  their  leader,  he  "whose  best  hope  it  had 
very  lately  been,  to  live  through  their  forbear- 


150         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

ance."  Most  of  the  Indians  promptly  deserted, 
not  caring  to  march  against  their  own  nation  at 
Detroit,  but  Henry  went  on  with  Bradstreet  and 
landed  at  Detroit  on  the  8th  of  August.  He  pro- 
ceeded up  Lake  Huron  with  two  companies  of 
troops  and  three  hundred  Canadian  volunteers  to 
Mackinac,  where  peace  was  concluded  with  the 
Indians  and  the  fort  was  reoccupied  by  English 
soldiers. 


CHAPTER   XII 

WAYNE'S  INDIAN  CAMPAIGN 

WITH  the  turn  of  a  single  page  of  his- 
tory and  the  passage  of  a  single  decade 
of  time,  during  this  century  of  struggle 
for  possession,  the  actors  in  the  drama  change,  or 
if  the  same  actors  remain,  a  new  set  of  circum- 
stances makes  them  play  a  new  part  amid  the  old 
scenes.     Like  the  bits  of  glass  in  a  kaleidoscope 
they  are  shaken  up  and  come  out  in  new  com- 
binations, and  with  them  our  ideas  and  sympathies 
are  shaken  up  and  must  be  readjusted. 

We  have  followed  the  fortunes  of  the  little 
English  garrisons  at  Detroit  and  Mackinac  in 
their  struggles  against  a  horde  of  savages,  and 
have  breathed  a  sigh  of  relief  when  a  strong 
British  army  came  to  the  rescue  and  England 
once  more  resumed  possession  of  her  lake  posts. 
We  return  to  Detroit  in  twelve  years  to  find 
General  Hamilton,  the  British  commander  of  the 
French-English  town,  reading  with  scorn  the 

'Si 


152          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

announcement  in  a  stray  copy  of  the  Pennsyl- 
vania Gazette  of  July,  1776,  that  a  new  American 
nation  has  been  formed  and  a  Declaration  of 
Independence  has  been  adopted.  Within  two 
years  Daniel  Boone,  the  hero  pioneer,  is  brought 
to  Detroit  a  British  prisoner,  taken  by  Indians 
in  their  raid  on  Kentucky,  and  before  he  has 
made  his  escape  from  prison,  Hamilton  is  chant- 
ing the  war-song  and  dancing  the  war-dance  at 
a  grand  council  of  Indians.  To  them  he  is  offer- 
ing his  congratulations  on  the  success  of  their 
raids  into  the  southern  states  of  the  newly  formed 
Union,  on  the  number  of  prisoners  they  have 
taken,  and  especially  on  the  far  greater  number 
of  scalps  they  have  brought.  The  War  of  the 
Revolution  has  begun,  and  with  it  a  period  of 
bloodshed  in  the  Northwest. 

While  the  main  bodies  of  troops  were  being 
marshalled  and  the  decisive  battles  were  being 
fought  in  the  south  and  the  east,  the  British 
carried  on  upon  the  western  frontier  an  incessant 
Indian  warfare.  This  border  campaign  was 
marked  by  a  horrible  series  of  bloody  raids  and 
massacres,  many  of  which  were  planned  at 
Niagara  and  Detroit.  Niagara,  wrested  in  the 
past  from  the  Indians  and  the  French,  became 


Wayne's  Indian  Campaign  153 

at  this  time  a  place  of  refuge  for  the  loyalists 
of  New  York,  "  a  nest  of  Tories,"  and  a  centre 
of  British  influence  so  strong  that  an  American 
leader  could  make  no  more  telling  expression 
of  his  dread  of  the  threatened  loss  of  a  southern 
point  of  vantage  than  to  say  that  it  must  be 
saved,  for  if  taken  by  the  British  it  would  become 
"  another  Niagara." 

From  Detroit,  Hamilton  set  out  in  the  summer 
of  1778  with  a  force  of  one  hundred  and  seventy- 
five  men  to  oust  from  Kaskaskia  and  Vincennes 
the  American  "  rebel,"  George  Rogers  Clark, 
who  had  taken  these  British  strongholds.  But 
instead  of  returning  to  Detroit  triumphant, 
Hamilton  was  taken  by  that  same  young  rebel 
and  started  on  a  twelve-hundred-mile  journey 
to  a  Virginia  prison.  Even  after  this  it  seemed 
to  the  Americans  that  plans  and  conspiracies 
came  out  from  Detroit  as  fast  as  prisoners  and 
scalps  went  into  the  British  prison  there.  There 
were  many  schemes  to  take  the  fort,  but  all  were 
abandoned  because  of  its  inaccessibility. 

When  the  negotiators  met  at  Paris,  in  1782,  to 
arrange  terms  of  peace  between  Great  Britain  and 
the  American  colonies  or  states,  it  was  difficult  to 
decide  what  should  be  done  with  the  Great  Lakes. 


154         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

At  first  it  was  suggested  that  the  boundary  line 
between  the  United  States  and  Canada  should  be 
so  drawn  as  to  give  the  territory  south  of  the 
Ottawa  River  and  Lake  Superior  to  the  United 
States,  as  far  west  as  the  Mississippi.  At  another 
time  it  was  proposed  that  all  of  the  land  north  of 
the  Ohio  and  west  of  the  Alleghanies  should  con- 
tinue to  be  English.  Finally  it  was  arranged 
that  the  Great  Lakes,  with  the  exception  of 
Michigan,  should  form  the  boundary  line  between 
the  United  States  and  Canada  in  that  part  of  the 
world.  This  arrangement  gave  to  the  United 
States  the  posts  at  Detroit,  Mackinac,  and  other 
points  on  the  lakes ;  but  the  English  would  not 
surrender  them,  justifying  their  not  doing  so  on 
the  ground  that  the  Americans  had  broken  the 
treaty  in  other  respects.  As  long  as  the  British 
retained  the  posts  in  the  Northwest,  the  Indians 
of  that  region  looked  to  them  for  support  and 
were  inclined  to  take  up  an  attitude  of  hostility 
to  the  government  of  the  United  States  and  to 
colonists,  who  now  came  into  the  Ohio  Valley 
in  great  numbers.  Treaties  were  made  with 
them,  but  these  the  Indians  failed  to  keep, 
and  there  ensued  a  period  of  confusion  and 
bloodshed  on  the  frontier.  Into  the  details 


Wayne's  Indian  Campaign  155 

of  this  petty  warfare  it  is  not  worth  our  while 
to  enter. 

At  first  the  British  seemed  anxious  to  preserve 
peace  for  the  sake  of  the  fur  trade,  but  as  time 
went  on  and  relations  between  England  and  the 
United  States  became  more  strained,  the  English 
lent  undisguised  assistance  to  the  Indians.  It 
was  inevitable  that  there  should  be  constant  strife 
between  the  rough,  encroaching  frontiersman  who 
overstepped  the  original  boundaries  and  the  jeal- 
ous, suspicious  Indian  who  met  all  wrongs  by 
treachery  and  violence.  The  record  of  the  years 
shows  a  succession  of  efforts  for  peace  by  the 
United  States  government  and  a  series  of  coun- 
cils, treaties,  ruptures,  and  hostilities  on  the  part 
of  the  Indians. 

A  formal  government  had  been  organized  in 
the  Northwest  by  the  Ordinance  of  1787,  which 
created  the  great  Northwest  Territory,  out  of 
which  were  later  formed  the  five  states  of  Ohio, 
Indiana,  Illinois,  Michigan,  and  Wisconsin.  By 
1789  and  1790  the  United  States  government 
began  to  realize  that  it  had  to  deal  in  this  region 
with  no  petty  skirmishes  with  scattered  tribes, 
but  with  a  widespread  Indian  uprising.  Raids 
and  counter-raids  must  be  abandoned,  and  war 


156         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

with  organized  armies  and  carefully  planned  cam- 
paigns must  be  waged  against  the  lawless  hordes 
of  savages  who  were  breaking  faith  with  the  white 
man  and  murdering  whom  they  pleased. 

An  expedition  under  the  leadership  of  General 
Harmar,  sent  north  in  1790  from  Fort  Washing- 
ton (Cincinnati),  met  defeat  at  the  hands  of  the 
Indians  at  the  present  Fort  Wayne.  A  similar 
expedition,  commanded  a  year  later  by  General 
St.  Clair,  was  routed  on  a  battle-ground  in  cen- 
tral Ohio,  and  the  whole  frontier  was  terrorized. 
Matters  had  now  become  serious.  Armies  of 
regulars  had  been  defeated  by  these  savage  mas- 
ters of  the  art  of  treacherous  warfare,  and  the 
Indians  were  becoming  more  and  more  aggressive 
in  their  elation  at  their  victories,  while  the  British 
were  becoming  more  and  more  open  in  their  sup- 
port of  the  lake  tribes. 

Needing  a  leader  who  could  drive  back  the 
Indians,  President  Washington  turned  to  a  sol- 
dier who  had  distinguished  himself  in  the  Revo- 
lutionary War  for  hard  fighting  and  daring 
bravery.  Major  General  Anthony  Wayne  had 
so  often  snatched  success  in  the  face  of  almost 
certain  defeat  that  he  had  earned  for  himself  the 
nickname  "  Mad  Anthony."  He  was  the  grand- 


Wayne's  Indian  Campaign  157 

son  of  a  Pennsylvanian  pioneer  and  had  had  hard 
schooling  from  his  Indian-fighting  grandfather  and 
father  in  the  methods  of  frontier  warfare.  Above 
all  else  he  gloried  in  difficulty  and  danger. 

In  April,  1792,  Washington  appointed  Gen- 
eral Wayne  to  the  command  of  the  army  and  sent 
him  to  the  Ohio  to  drill  his  men.  Wayne  found 
there  the  remnant  of  St.  Clair's  force,  to  which 
were  being  constantly  added  hundreds  of  raw  re- 
cruits enlisted  under  new  legislation  for  the  cam- 
paign by  Congress.  The  one  stipulation  that 
Wayne  had  made  when  he  took  command  was 
that  he  be  allowed  to  wait  to  fight  until  his  ranks 
were  full  and  his  men  thoroughly  trained.  He 
knew  that  he  had  to  deal  with  the  same  kind  of 
men  who  had  failed  St.  Clair.  He  attributed  this 
failure  to  poor  organization  and  lack  of  military 
discipline.  He  knew,  too,  that  he  had  the  added 
difficulty  of  meeting  the  paralyzing  discourage- 
ment caused  by  previous  defeats  and  well-remem- 
bered scenes  of  horror.  Patiently  and  deliberately 
he  went  to  work,  and  new  recruits  arriving  in  the 
summer  and  autumn  found  themselves  living 
in  a  camp  where  an  army  was  being  taught  with 
all  speed  the  essentials  of  warfare.  By  spring 
Wayne  had  twenty-five  hundred  soldiers  who 


158          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

were  eager  for  the  campaign  and  worthy  of  their 
commander. 

Congress  was  reluctant  to  begin  war  and  kept 
Wayne  waiting  all  through  the  summer  of  1793, 
while  it  made  fruitless  negotiations  with  the  In- 
dians. The  tribes  finally  demanded  that  the 
Ohio  River  should  be  the  boundary  of  Ameri- 
can advance,  and  to  this  the  government  could 
not  agree.  In  October  Wayne  was  given  permis- 
sion to  open  his  campaign,  but  with  cautions  that 
on  no  account  was  he  to  run  any  risks  of  defeat. 
He  moved  his  men  from  Fort  Washington  to  a 
point  eighty  miles  north,  which  he  fortified  as 
a  winter  camp  and  named  Greenville  in  honor  of 
his  former  comrade  at  arms,  Captain  Nathanael 
Greene.  Here  he  spent  the  winter,  sending  a 
large  detachment  of  his  men  north  to  build  on 
St.  Clair's  fatal  battle-ground  a  fort  which  was 
prophetically  named  Fort  Recovery.  Several 
skirmishes  with  the  Indians  took  place  at  Green- 
ville during  the  winter,  and  in  the  early  summer 
a  large  war-party  made  an  unsuccessful  attack  on 
Fort  Recovery.  On  the  ijth  of  July,  1794, 
General  Wayne  started  with  his  "  legion "  of 
troops,  more  than  two  thousand  men,  for  the 
Miami  towns  of  northern  Ohio. 


Wayne's  Indian  Campaign 

The  march  of  the  American  army  was  watched 
with  wonder  and  admiration  by  the  Indians,  who 
reported  to  the  British  that  the  soldiers  went 
twice  as  far  in  a  day  as  St.  Clair's  had  done,  that 
Wayne  kept  scouts  out  in  every  direction,  and 
that  he  was  always  ready  for  attack  and  guarded 
carefully  against  ambush  by  day  or  surprise  by 
night.  At  the  junction  of  the  Maumee  and 
Auglaize  rivers,  where  the  line  of  hostile  Indian 
villages  began,  Wayne  built  a  strong  log  stock- 
ade which  he  christened  with  the  characteristic 
name  of  Fort  Defiance,  a  name  perpetuated  to 
this  day.  Warned  of  his  approach,  the  Indians 
had  fled,  leaving  their  homes  and  their  rich  fields 
of  corn  and  vegetables,  in  which  the  soldiers  rev- 
elled after  their  hard  march  and  short  rations. 
From  Fort  Defiance  Wayne  sent  a  final  offer  of 
peace  to  the  Indians,  declaring  that  he  would 
restore  to  them  their  lands  and  villages  and  pre- 
serve their  women  and  children  from  famine 
should  they  agree  to  a  lasting  peace.  The  In- 
dians returned  an  evasive  answer,  and  Wayne 
advanced  against  them.  From  scouts  he  learned 
that  the  natives  were  encamped  near  the  British 
fort  on  the  Maumee  River  a  few  miles  west  of  the 
present  city  of  Toledo.  There  were  between 


160         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

fifteen  hundred  and  two  thousand  warriors  in 
all,  with  seventy  rangers  from  Detroit,  —  the 
latter  company  being  made  up  of  French,  Eng- 
lish, and  other  refugees. 

On  the  2Oth  of  August  Wayne  met  the 
Indians  at  a  spot  some  six  miles  down  the  river, 
known  as  the  Fallen  Timbers  because  there  a 
whirlwind  had  overturned  the  forest  and  left  the 
trees  piled  across  one  another  in  rows.  Wayne's 
army  numbered  about  three  thousand  men,  two- 
thirds  of  whom  were  regulars,  and  one-third 
mounted  volunteers  from  Kentucky  led  by 
General  Scott.  At  the  front  of  the  line  was  a 
small  force  of  mounted  volunteers,  and  back  of 
them  were  the  carefully  placed  lines  of  infantry 
and  cavalry.  The  Indians  were  secreted  as  usual 
in  the  woods  and  tall  grass  and  behind  the  piles 
of  trees.  From  their  shelter  they  poured  a 
murderous  fire  into  the  ranks  of  the  army,  but 
the  volunteers  pressed  on.  The  front  line  of 
infantry  rushed  up  and  dislodged  the  savages 
from  their  covert,  the  cavalry  dashed  over  the 
rough  ground  and  the  piles  of  logs,  and  the 
Indians  fled  before  the  second  line  of  soldiers 
could  even  come  up  to  the  battle-field.  Of  this 
engagement  one  of  the  men  wrote  that  there  was 


Wayne's  Indian  Campaign  161 

not  "  a  sufficiency  of  the  enemy  for  the  Legion  to 
play  upon."  The  entire  action  lasted  less  than 
forty  minutes,  and  not  a  third  of  Wayne's  force 
took  part  in  it.  The  army  pursued  the  fugitives 
two  miles  to  the  shelter  of  the  British  fort,  and 
then  burned  everything  near  by.  Thirty-three 
Americans  were  killed  and  one  hundred  wounded 
in  this  engagement,  which  closed  a  forty  years' 
warfare  with  the  Indians  in  as  many  minutes. 
Wayne's  carefully  drilled  troops  had  won  the 
most  decisive  victory  ever  gained  over  the 
Indians  of  the  Northwest. 

General  Wayne  completed  his  conquest  by 
marching  back  to  Fort  Recovery,  and  thence 
westward  to  the  Miami  towns  at  the  junction  of 
St.  Mary's  and  St.  Joseph's  rivers,  the  scene  of 
Harmar's  disaster.  The  Indians  dared  offer  no 
resistance,  but  fled  before  his  triumphant  army. 
Along  his  route  he  burned  their  villages,  and  at 
the  meeting-place  of  the  rivers  he  built  the  fort 
which  was  to  perpetuate  his  name  to  the  present 
day,  Fort  Wayne.  Then  he  returned  to  Green- 
ville for  the  winter.  Meanwhile  the  anger  of 
the  Indians  had  been  stirred  by  the  inaction  of 
their  British  allies,  who  had  urged  them  on  to 
war  but  had  furnished  no  troops  from  Detroit. 


1 62          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

A  new  respect  had  been  called  forth  for  the 
Americans.  All  the  winter  Wayne  received  at 
Greenville  delegations  from  various  Indian  tribes, 
and  in  the  summer  of  1795  a  formal  treaty  was 
signed,  in  which  Wayne,  representing  the  United 
States,  made  peace  with  all  the  western  tribes. 
Eleven  hundred  and  thirty  Indians  assembled, 
making  a  full  representation  from  all  tribes  pre- 
viously hostile.  Gathered  about  the  council-fire 
and  supplied  with  a  pile  of  wampum  strings,  the 
chiefs  and  the  American  general  conferred  day 
after  day  as  the  various  groups  of  Indians  arrived 
during  the  months  of  June  and  July.  The  record 
of  their  speeches  is  eighty  pages  long  and  carries 
one  back  to  the  days  when  Champlain  and  Fron- 
tenac  conferred  with  their  Indian  children  and  re- 
ceived their  repentant  promises  of  good  behavior 
in  the  future ;  but  now  Wayne  was  addressed  by 
the  chiefs  as  "  Elder  Brother,"  and  he  called  them 
always  his  younger  brothers. 

By  the  treaty  of  Greenville  the  Indians  ceded 
to  the  United  States  all  of  what  is  now  southern 
Ohio  and  southeastern  Indiana,  various  reserva- 
tions about  the  forts  of  Detroit,  Michilimackinac, 
and  those  which  Wayne  had  built,  a  six-mile 
tract  at  Chicago,  and  a  large  grant  of  land  near 


Wayne's  Indian  Campaign  163 

the  Falls  of  the  Ohio.  The  government,  in  its 
turn,  agreed  to  the  Indian  title  to  the  remaining 
country,  and  promised  to  pay  the  tribes  large 
annuities.  Both  sides  were  to  return  all  prisoners. 
Wayne,  by  his  skill  at  warfare,  had  brought  to  the 
borders  a  peace  that  lasted  for  fifteen  years,  when 
new  conditions  brought  new  difficulties. 

While  Wayne  was  fighting  for  the  supremacy 
of  the  United  States  in  the  Northwest,  John  Jay 
was  representing  the  government  in  London  in 
negotiations  for  a  treaty  which  should  settle  dis- 
puted points  between  the  two  nations,  providing, 
among  other  things,  for  the  settlement  by  a  com- 
mission of  any  ambiguities  in  the  boundaries  and 
for  the  surrender  of  the  lake  posts  to  the  Ameri- 
cans. In  1796  this  treaty  was  ratified  by  Con- 
gress, and  American  officers  were  sent  to  take 
command  of  the  various  posts.  With  appro- 
priate ceremonies  the  English  flag  was  lowered 
and  the  American  Stars  and  Stripes  were  raised 
at  each  of  the  posts  whose  history  we  have  fol- 
lowed under  French  and  later  under  English 
control.  General  Wayne  was  sent  by  a  grateful 
Congress  to  conduct  the  final  transfer  of  the  forts. 
After  a  twelve-hundred-mile  journey  he  arrived 
at  Detroit,  where  he  was  received  with  great 


164         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

honor  by  Indians,  English,  French,  and  Ameri- 
cans. Leaving  there  in  November  for  Presque 
Isle,  he  was  taken  with  his  old  enemy,  the  gout, 
and  died  at  that  place.  His  remains  were  later 
removed  by  his  son  to  Philadelphia,  but  a  log- 
house,  patterned  after  the  one  which  Wayne  him- 
self built  there  in  1790,  marks  to-day  the  place 
of  his  grave  at  the  present  city  of  Erie,  Pennsyl- 
vania. 

It  is  worthy  of  note  that  the  month  before 
General  Wayne  started  for  Detroit  to  conclude 
the  ceremonies  of  taking  possession  of  that  post, 
Moses  Cleveland,  with  a  party  of  Connecticut 
pioneers,  set  out  to  found  on  the  shores  of  Lake 
Erie  the  city  which  bears  his  name,  —  the  ad- 
vance guard  of  an  army  of  occupation  which  the 
stipulations  of  the  treaty  of  Greenville  and 
Wayne's  intimidation  of  the  Indians  made 
possible. 


CHAPTER   XIII 

THE  GREAT  LAKES  IN  THE  WAR  OF  l8l2 

FROM  the  surrender  of  the  northwest  posts 
and  the  founding  of  Cleveland  to  the  year 
1812,  there  is  little  to  note  in  the  history 
of  the  Great  Lakes.  The  forts  were  gradually 
strengthened,  the  fur  trade  was  continued,  and  a 
few  settlements  were  made  on  the  southern  shores 
of  Lake  Erie  and  Lake  Ontario.  Travel  and 
transportation  between  the  Atlantic  seaboard  and 
the  Great  Lakes  were  so  difficult  that  few  settlers 
found  their  way  into  the  lake  region,  and  there 
was  no  market  for  such  agricultural  products  as 
were  raised.  In  the  same  period  the  Ohio  Valley 
was  fast  filling  up,  and  settlers  were  pushing  west- 
ward and  northward  from  the  Ohio  River  into 
central  Ohio  and  Indiana.  The  ever  increasing 
pressure  on  the  Indians  of  that  region  aroused 
their  fears  and  resentment,  and  made  them  listen 
to  the  plans  of  an  able  chieftain,  Tecumseh,  who 
banded  them  together  in  a  strong  league  for  re- 

165 


1 66         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

sistance  to  the  whites.  The  natives  looked  for  aid 
to  the  British  in  Canada,  but  how  far  these  had  gone 
in  encouraging  the  Indians  is  unknown.  In  1811 
matters  became  so  serious  that  General  William 
Henry  Harrison,  Governor  of  Indiana  Territory, 
marched  against  the  Indians  and  defeated  them 
in  the  battle  of  Tippecanoe.  When  the  War  of 
1812  began,  Tecumseh  and  many  of  his  allies 
joined  the  British. 

The  opening  of  the  war  found  the  lake  frontier 
of  the  United  States  exposed  and  almost  unpro- 
tected. At  Fort  Wayne  there  were  eighty-five 
soldiers,  at  Fort  Harrison  (Terre  Haute)  fifty, 
at  Fort  Dearborn  (Chicago)  fifty-three,  at  Fort 
Mackinac  eighty-eight,  and  at  Detroit  one  hun- 
dred and  twenty.  The  last-named  post  claimed 
early  attention,  because  of  its  great  importance, 
and  also  because  of  its  exposed  situation.  Its  loss 
to  the  United  States  would  mean  the  loss  of  the 
upper  lakes,  at  least  temporarily.  The  problem 
was  a  difficult  one  because  the  United  States 
had  no  war  vessels  on  the  lakes  to  secure  com- 
munication between  Detroit  and  the  settlements 
on  the  southeastern  shore  of  Lake  Erie.  Will- 
iam Hull,  Governor  of  Michigan  Territory,  fully 
recognized  the  importance  of  a  naval  force,  but 


The  Great  Lakes  in  the  War  of  1812      167 

he  was  obliged  to  do  what  he  could  to  defend 
Detroit  without  one.  In  the  spring  of  1812,  with 
three  regiments  of  Ohio  militia,  a  troop  of  Ohio 
dragoons,  and  a  regiment  of  United  States  infan- 
try,—  in  all  about  sixteen  hundred  men,  —  he 
set  out  from  the  settlements  in  Ohio  to  march 
overland  to  reenforce  this  important  post.  The 
route  lay  through  the  wilderness,  much  of  the 
way  over  swampy  grounds,  but  the  soldiers  cut 
roads  and  advanced  with  a  rapidity  that  amazed 
the  British.  At  Frenchtown,  on  the  River 
Raisin,  forty  miles  below  Detroit,  Hull  received 
word  that  war  had  been  declared.  Before  this  he 
had  sent  a  schooner  to  Detroit  with  supplies  and 
a  letter  to  the  commandant  apprising  him  of  his 
coming.  This  vessel  was  seized  by  the  British 
soldiers  stationed  at  Maiden,  on  the  Canadian 
side  of  the  Detroit  River,  and  some  distance 
below  the  American  town. 

On  the  5th  of  July,  1812,  Hull  reached  De- 
troit. Besides  its  small  garrison,  the  town  con- 
tained about  eight  hundred  inhabitants.  It  was 
defensible  from  Indian  attacks,  but  was  within 
gunshot  of  the  British  side  of  the  Detroit  River, 
was  insufficiently  supplied  with  provisions  and 
ammunition  for  a  siege,  and  was  liable  to  be 


1 68         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

completely  cut  off  from  communication  with  the 
United  States  should  the  British  gain  command 
of  Lake  Erie  and  the  road  along  the  river  to  the 
south.  At  once,  Hull  seized  the  town  of  Sand- 
wich, opposite  Detroit,  and  issued  a  proclamation 
to  the  inhabitants  of  Canada  which  brought  many 
of  them  over  to  the  American  side,  but  an  expedi- 
tion which  was  to  have  reenforced  him  from 
Niagara  came  to  naught. 

On  the  British  side  in  the  spring  of  1812, 
affairs  seemed  even  more  gloomy,  but  the  diffi- 
culties were  overcome  by  the  capability  and  cour- 
age of  one  man,  Brigadier  General  Isaac  Brock, 
who  exercised  entire  command  in  upper  Canada. 
He  had  at  his  disposal  barely  two  thousand  men, 
who  were  hundreds  of  miles  from  their  supplies 
and  scattered  through  several  posts.  When  war 
seemed  imminent,  Brock  fitted  out  armed  vessels 
on  Lake  Erie  and  strengthened  the  defences  of 
Maiden.  The  moment  war  was  declared,  he 
directed  a  subordinate  to  seize  the  American  post 
at  Michilimackinac  and  himself  hurried  with  all 
available  men  to  the  Detroit  River. 

Day  after  day  the  American  army  waited  at 
Sandwich  before  striking  a  decisive  blow  at  the 
British  in  their  fort  at  Maiden.  General  Hull 


The  Great  Lakes  in  the  War  of  1812      169 

had,  indeed,  good  reason  for  fear  of  failure,  for 
although  he  had  more  men  than  the  British,  the 
English  army  had  in  its  fortification  a  base  of 
attack,  and  in  its  fleet  a  pronounced  advantage. 
With  ineffective  sallies  into  the  neighboring 
country  and  prolonged  councils  of  war  the  days 
wore  on,  and  the  officers  as  well  as  the  rank  and 
file  of  the  army  became  more  and  more  dis- 
heartened. They  had  crossed  the  river  July 
12.  They  finally  set  August  8  for  the  attack 
on  Maiden ;  but  meanwhile  word  came  that 
British  reinforcements  were  on  their  way  to  the 
fort,  and  that  a  party  of  Indians  under  Tecumseh 
had  captured  the  American  supplies  and  mail- 
bags  coming  from  Ohio.  Prisoners  of  war  from 
Fort  Mackinac  arrived  at  the  American  camp, 
announcing  that  their  fort  had  been  surrendered 
and  that  a  horde  of  Indians  were  coming  from 
the  Northwest  to  attack  Detroit  in  the  rear. 
With  the  British  garrison  at  Maiden  increased, 
Detroit  threatened  by  the  Indians,  and  the  line  of 
communication  between  the  American  army  and 
headquarters  in  danger,  Hull  saw  nothing  to  do  but 
to  recross  the  river ;  and  on  the  night  of  the  day 
when  he  had  planned  to  attack  the  British  fort  he 
withdrew  with  his  force  to  Detroit. 


170         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

Meanwhile  General  Brock  reached  Maiden, 
held  a  council  of  war  at  which  Tecumseh  with 
his  following  of  a  thousand  Indians  was  present, 
and  sent  to  General  Hull  a  summons  to  sur- 
render. Hull  refused  to  yield  and  started  mes- 
sengers to  recall  an  expedition  of  three  hundred 
and  fifty  men  which  he  had  despatched  under 
two  Ohio  colonels,  MacArthur  and  Lewis  Cass, 
to  the  River  Raisin  to  rescue  the  necessary  sup- 
plies for  the  army.  As  soon  as  Huirs  reply  was 
received  two  British  vessels  moved  up  the  river 
to  Sandwich,  where  their  guns  could  cover  the 
American  fort.  During  the  night  Tecumseh  and 
six  hundred  Indians  crossed  to  the  American 
side  of  the  river  and  established  themselves  in 
the  woods  at  a  point  where  they  could  intercept 
the  returning  Ohio  colonels  with  their  force.  On 
the  morning  of  August  16,  General  Brock 
crossed  the  river  with  seven  hundred  soldiers. 
The  British  commander  had  intended  to  take  up 
a  position  and  force  Hull  to  attack  him,  but 
after  he  reached  the  American  bank  of  the 
river,  he  learned  from  Tecumseh  that  the  Ohio 
detachment  was  only  a  few  miles  away.  Fearing 
lest  he  be  surrounded  if  he  delay,  Brock  deter- 
mined to  make  an  immediate  attack. 


The  Great  Lakes  in  the  War  of  1812      171 

Within  his  tent  General  Hull  sat  debating 
what  to  do.  Should  he  admit  to  his  officers  and 
men  his  desire  to  surrender  at  once,  their  undis- 
guised scorn  at  his  previous  delays  would  perhaps 
turn  to  open  mutiny ;  yet  he  felt  sure  that  the 
fort  must  ultimately  be  taken,  and  he  dreaded  the 
loss  of  life  and  possible  Indian  massacre  should 
he  hold  out.  The  British  column  began  to  ad- 
vance. Every  soldier  expected  that  the  heavy 
American  guns  which  were  pointed  toward  them 
would  be  lighted  and  discharged  into  their  midst ; 
instead,  an  American  was  seen  advancing  from  the 
fort  with  a  white  flag.  Within  an  hour,  and  with- 
out the  firing  of  a  single  shot,  the  surprised  British 
troops  found  themselves  in  possession  of  Detroit. 
Hull  included  in  the  terms  of  capitulation  not 
only  the  troops  within  the  fort  but  the  Ohio  de- 
tachment now  advancing  up  the  river,  so  that 
General  Brock  gained  at  least  twenty-five  hundred 
prisoners  of  war.  The  mortification  of  the  coun- 
try at  the  whole  course  of  the  war  vented  itself 
after  this  surrender  upon  General  Hull,  who  was 
really  the  victim  of  poor  management  of  the  army 
and  lack  of  support  at  headquarters.  He  might 
have  been  forced  to  give  up  Detroit  within  a  few 
weeks  unless  he  was  reenforced,  but  he  could  have 


1 72          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

kept  Brock  from  returning  to  harry  Niagara  in 
nine  days. 

Detroit  was  surrendered  on  the  morning  of 
August  1 6.  On  the  same  day  and  at  the  same 
hour  Fort  Dearborn  at  Chicago  was  being  burned 
by  an  Indian  war-party,  after  the  members  of  its 
garrison  had  been  massacred.  Two  weeks  earlier 
Hull  had  sent  an  order  to  Captain  Heald,  com- 
mander of  the  fort,  to  evacuate  it  if  practicable. 
The  Indian  runner  reached  Fort  Dearborn  on 
August  9  with  this  message  and  with  the  news  of 
the  fall  of  Fort  Mackinac,  the  receipt  of  which 
had  been  the  occasion  of  Hull's  decision  in  regard 
to  Chicago. 

It  had  taken  the  Indian  messenger  a  suspi- 
ciously long  time  to  make  the  journey,  and  as 
Indians  from  a  distance  began  to  gather  about  the 
fort  it  was  surmised  that  he  had  in  some  way 
learned  the  contents  of  the  message,  and  in  par- 
ticular the  clause  which  directed  that  Captain 
Heald  deliver  up  to  the  Indians  all  the  public 
property  of  the  garrison,  and  had  told  the  news 
along  the  way.  Accounts  differ  as  to  what  Cap- 
tain Heald  promised  to  the  Indians.  According 
to  the  story  of  Mr.  Kinzie,  a  trader  in  the  fort, 
Captain  Heald  held  a  council  with  them,  at  which 


The  Great  Lakes  in  the  War  of  1812      173 

he  agreed  to  divide  among  them  the  public  prop- 
erty at  the  fort  on  condition  that  they  should 
furnish  him  with  a  friendly  escort.  Unfortunately 
the  two  things  that  the  Indians  most  wanted  were 
ammunition  and  liquor.  These  the  white  men 
considered  it  an  act  of  madness  to  put  into  their 
hands,  and  under  cover  of  night  knocked  in  the 
heads  of  the  barrels  and  poured  the  whiskey  into 
the  river,  threw  powder,  bags  of  shot,  and  cart- 
ridges into  the  river,  and  breaking  to  pieces  the 
muskets  and  pistols  they  could  not  take  with  them, 
dropped  them  into  a  well.  An  unknown  writer, 
who  was  present  at  the  time,  distinctly  states  that 
Heald  objected  to  this  act  and  argued  that  it  was 
a  bad  thing  to  lie  to  an  Indian.  The  watchful 
Indians  found  out  what  had  been  done,  and  from 
that  time  on  the  older  chiefs  were  unable  to  re- 
strain the  anger  of  their  young  men.  So  many 
Indians  had  gathered  that  the  officers  became 
convinced  that  the  tribes  had  been  notified  by  the 
messenger  from  Detroit  as  he  made  his  trip  of  the 
distribution  of  gifts  that  was  to  take  place.  The 
supply  of  blankets,  paints,  calicoes,  and  trinkets 
that  were  given  out  did  not  satisfy  the  warriors. 

On  the  evening  of  the    ijth    of  August  the 
garrison  was  cheered  by  the   arrival    from    Fort 


174         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

Wayne  of  Captain  William  Wells,  a  famous  In- 
dian fighter  and  uncle  of  Mrs.  Heald,  the  com- 
mander's wife.  This  man  had  had  a  most  roman- 
tic life.  Born  in  Kentucky,  he  had  been  stolen 
when  a  boy  of  twelve  by  the  Indians  and  adopted 
by  a  chief  of  the  Miamis,  whose  daughter  he  had 
married.  He  had  grown  up  with  the  Indians 
and  fought  their  battles  with  them  as  a  matter  of 
course,  taking  part  in  the  engagements  with  Gen- 
eral Harmar  and  General  St.  Clair.  Discovered 
by  his  Kentucky  kindred  and  convinced  that  he 
was  brother  of  Captain  Samuel  Wells,  he  had  been 
persuaded  after  a  time  to  return  to  his  own  people. 
He  had  bidden  his  Indian  father-in-law  a  dra- 
matic farewell,  telling  him  that  in  the  past  they  had 
been  friends,  but  henceforth  they  must  be  ene- 
mies ;  but  as  a  matter  of  fact  he  had  always  kept 
in  friendly  relation  with  his  former  chief  and  had 
on  one  occasion  saved  his  family  from  being  taken 
prisoners.  He  had  been  one  of  Wayne's  most 
valuable  scouts,  and  had  since  occupied  the  posi- 
tion of  Indian  agent,  first  at  Chicago  and  now  at 
Fort  Wayne,  where  he  was  living  with  his  Indian 
wife.  Hearing  of  the  probable  evacuation  of 
Fort  Dearborn  he  had  marched  thither  with  all 
haste,  bringing  a  party  of  thirty  friendly  Miamis 


The  Great  Lakes  in  the  War  of  1812      175 

in  the  hope  that  he  could  be  of  assistance  to 
his  friends  and  especially  to  his  favorite  niece, 
Mrs.  Heald. 

On  the  morning  of  the  I5th  of  August,  at  nine 
o'clock,  the  soldiers  left  the  fort  for  their  journey 
of  two  hundred  and  eighty  miles  to  Detroit. 
Without  a  sign  of  ill-feeling  the  Indians  bade 
them  good-by,  and  the  little  party  started  along 
the  lake  shore.  Captain  Wells  with  half  his  Mi- 
amis,  all  mounted  on  Indian  ponies,  led  the  line. 
The  soldiers  of  the  garrison  with  the  wagons,  in 
which  sat  the  twelve  women  and  twenty  children, 
followed  directly  behind  them,  and  the  remainder 
of  the  friendly  Miamis  brought  up  the  rear. 
The  escort  of  five  hundred  furnished  by  the 
neighboring  tribes  kept  abreast  of  the  troops  until 
they  reached  the  sand-hills,  a  quarter  of  a  mile 
from  the  fort.  There  they  struck  out  suddenly 
into  the  prairie  and  disappeared,  hurrying  forward 
to  prepare  an  ambuscade. 

The  little  company  had  proceeded  about  a 
mile  and  a  half  when  Captain  Wells  was  seen  to 
turn  and  ride  back,  swinging  his  hat  in  a  circle 
above  his  head,  which,  in  the  sign  language  of 
the  frontier,  meant :  "  We  are  surrounded  by 
Indians."  As  he  came  nearer  he  shouted,  "We 


176         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

are  surrounded.  March  up  on  the  sand  ridges." 
All  at  once,  in  the  language  of  Mrs.  Heald,  who 
left  a  graphic  report,  they  saw  "  Indians'  heads 
sticking  up  and  down  again  here  and  there,  like 
turtles  out  of  water."  As  the  member  of  the 
party  most  experienced  in  Indian  warfare,  Captain 
Wells  was  immediately  put  in  command.  He 
led  the  men  in  a  charge  up  the  bank,  and  with  a 
volley  of  shot  they  broke  the  line  of  the  Indians. 
A  second  time  they  charged,  and  again  the  In- 
dians drew  back.  But  though  they  were  beaten 
in  front,  they  poured  in  from  all  sides,  captured 
the  horses  and  baggage,  and  began  to  kill  the 
women  and  children.  For  fifteen  or  twenty 
minutes  the  fight  went  on.  Captain  Wells  was 
here,  there,  and  everywhere.  With  two  pistols 
and  a  gun,  which  he  kept  reloading  with  light- 
ning rapidity,  he  sighted  and  brought  down  the 
warriors  in  the  midst  of  their  wanton  work. 

Wounded  himself  and  isolated  on  a  mound 
with  a  remnant  of  his  men,  Captain  Heald  saw 
that  there  was  no  hope  but  to  surrender.  The 
Indians  made  signs  for  him  to  approach  them, 
and  he  offered  to  surrender  in  the  hope  of  sparing 
further  bloodshed.  His  own  wife  was  slightly 
wounded,  and  Mrs.  Helm,  the  wife  of  his  lieu- 


The  Great  Lakes  in  the  War  of  1812      177 

tenant,  had  only  been  saved  from  being  toma- 
hawked by  the  friendly  chief,  Black  Partridge, 
who  seized  her  from  the  grasp  of  her  captor,  and 
took  her  to  the  water,  where  he  made  feint  to 
drown  her,  but  kept  her  head  out  until  the  fight 
was  over.  After  the  surrender  Captain  Wells 
rode  up,  desperately  wounded,  to  send  farewell 
messages  to  his  wife,  and  was  killed  on  the  in- 
stant by  a  group  of  Indians,  who  mangled  his 
body  horribly.  Of  the  ninety-three  in  the  party 
but  thirty -six  were  still  living.  Of  the  sixty-six 
fighting  men  forty-three  had  been  killed,  and 
only  seven  women  and  six  children  survived. 
Some  of  the  prisoners  made  their  escape,  finding 
their  way  to  safety  through  a  series  of  hairbreadth 
adventures ;  some  died  in  captivity,  and  others 
were  exchanged  at  intervals  during  the  next  two 
years.  On  the  spot  where  the  massacre  took 
place, —  then  out  in  open  prairie,  now  at  the  foot 
of  Eighteenth  Street  in  the  city  of  Chicago,  —  there 

stands  a  noble  monument  to  the  Fort  Dearborn 

HUWcoP  So 
garrison. 

With  Fort  Dearborn  and  Fort  Mackinac  aban- 
doned, the  last  American  defences  on  the  west- 
ern lakes  were  gone.  The  boundary  line  of  the 
United  States  became  the  Wabash  and  Maumee 


178         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

rivers,  and  the  surrender  of  Detroit  made  it 
doubtful  whether  even  that  line  could  be 
maintained.  The  hold  of  the  United  States  on 
the  Great  Lakes  in  August,  1812,  looked  very 
uncertain. 


CHAPTER   XIV 

THE    CONQUEST    OF    LAKE    ERIE 

THE  year  1813  began  with  another  dis- 
aster for  the  United  States.  After  the 
surrender  of  Detroit,  Governor  William 
Henry  Harrison,  of  the  Indiana  Territory,  placed 
himself  at  the  head  of  a  popular  movement  to 
retrieve  the  defeat  at  any  cost  and  to  recover 
Detroit.  It  was  winter  before  he  succeeded  in 
getting  an  army  within  reach  of  the  lake  coast. 
For  months  the  three  divisions  of  his  force  of  ten 
thousand  men  struggled  through  the  swampy 
lands  of  Ohio,  where  the  movement  of  troops 
and  of  necessary  provisions  was  rendered  well- 
nigh  impossible  by  the  heavy  rains.  On  the 
1 5th  of  January  two  Frenchmen  had  entered 
the  camp  of  the  advance  division  of  the  army, 
which  under  command  of  General  Winchester  was 
establishing  itself  at  a  point  on  the  Maumee  River 
twenty  miles  inland  from  Lake  Erie.  They  urged 
the  troops  to  occupy  Frenchtown,  a  village  on  the 

179 


180         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

American  shore  of  Lake  Erie  but  within  British 
lines.  This  town  on  the  River  Raisin  was  held  by 
Canadians  and  Indians,  and  its  loss,  if  taken  by  the 
Americans,  would  be  a  serious  blow  to  the  British. 
Six  hundred  and  fifty  men,  the  flower  of  the  Ken- 
tucky regiments,  started  under  the  command  of 
Colonel  Lewis  for  the  attack.  After  considerable 
losses  the  Americans  seized  the  town.  General 
Winchester  hastened  to  their  support  with  three 
hundred  more  men,  making  a  total  American  force 
at  the  River  Raisin  of  eight  or  nine  hundred  men. 
General  Proctor,  Brock's  successor  at  Fort 
Maiden,  had  under  his  command  over  two  thou- 
sand soldiers.  On  the  morning  of  January  22, 
1813,  he  crossed  the  lake  on  the  ice  with  a  force 
of  six  hundred  men  and  from  six  to  eight  hun- 
dred Indians  and  attacked  the  Americans  in  the 
ill-fortified  village.  When  the  hard-fought  en- 
gagement was  ended  four  hundred  Americans 
were  missing,  either  killed  during  the  battle 
by  the  British  or  scalped  by  the  Indians  in  the 
horrible  massacre  that  followed  the  defeat.  Only 
after  the  ammunition  had  given  out  and  retreat 
had  been  proved  impossible  because  of  the  deep 
snow  and  the  position  of  the  enemy,  did  the 
last  of  the  gallant  Kentuckians  surrender.  "  Re- 


The  Conquest  of  Lake  Erie  181 

member  the  River  Raisin  "  became  the  watch- 
word of  a  desperate  people,  and  operations  on 
the  Great  Lakes  were  suspended  until  Commo- 
dore Perry  was  ready  with  his  navy  to  retrieve 
these  defeats  and  turn  the  tide  of  American 
fortune. 

Oliver  Hazard  Perry  had  been  brought  up  in 
the  naval  service.  His  father  was  a  gallant  sea- 
man who  had  fought  in  the  Revolution  and  been 
on  the  sea  ever  since.  When  Oliver  was  ready  he 
was  appointed  midshipman  on  his  father's  ship, 
and  had  seen  since  that  day  service  in  the  West 
Indies,  in  the  Tripoli  tan  war,  and  off  the  Atlan- 
tic coast.  At  the  beginning  of  the  War  of  1812 
he  was  put  in  charge  of  a  flotilla  of  gun-boats 
stationed  at  Newport,  but  he  had  petitioned  to 
be  removed  from  this  retirement  and  placed  in 
active  service,  preferably  on  the  lakes.  He  was 
summoned  in  the  winter  of  1813  to  take  charge 
of  the  construction  of  vessels  on  Lake  Erie.  He 
found  the  lake  fleet  divided.  At  the  Black 
Rock  Navy  Yard  on  the  Niagara  River  lay  sev- 
eral vessels,  unable  to  get  out  past  the  British 
fleet  and  the  overlooking  British  forts.  At  Erie, 
Pennsylvania,  two  brigs,  a  schooner,  and  a  gun- 
boat were  being  built.  It  was  for  Perry  to  unite 


1 82         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

the  two  sections  of  the  fleet,  to  provide  them 
with  a  crew  of  able  seamen,  and  to  force  the 
British  fleet  into  decisive  action. 

An  American  victory  on  the  Niagara  River 
on  the  27th  of  May  set  free  the  vessels  at  Black 
Rock.  Perry  was  on  hand  to  superintend  their 
laborious  removal  from  the  navy-yard.  Oxen 
and  men  worked  day  after  day  dragging  the 
vessels  against  the  heavy  current  of  the  river  into 
Lake  Erie.  Once  on  the  waters  of  the  lake 
the  American  ships  under  Perry's  command 
evaded  the  British  cruisers  which  were  sail- 
ing back  and  forth  between  Niagara  and  Erie, 
with  the  sole  purpose  of  intercepting  them, 
and  reached  the  latter  port  in  safety.  For 
two  months  the  fleet  lay  in  that  harbor  while 
Perry  strained  every  nerve  to  get  the  vessels 
into  shape  and  secure  sailors  to  man  them. 
We  get  a  little  idea  of  his  difficulties  by  the  fact 
that  between  the  last  of  May  and  the  first  of 
August  he  cut  down  his  requirements  in  the  num- 
ber of  seamen  to  one-half  his  original  estimate. 
On  the  sixth  day  of  August  all  preparations  were 
completed  and  the  fleet  sailed  out  on  Lake  Erie. 

Commodore  Perry  was  twenty-eight  years  old ; 
his  antagonist,  Barclay,  was  thirty-two.  Barclay 


The  Conquest  of  Lake  Erie  183 

had  met  as  many  difficulties  as  Perry  in  getting 
his  fleet  ready,  and  especially  in  securing  pro- 
visions for  his  men.  The  American  squadron 
had,  moreover,  cut  off  communication  between 
Fort  Maiden  and  its  source  of  supplies.  So  in 
September,  even  though  his  best  vessel,  the 
Detroit,  had  to  be  launched  unfinished  from  the 
stocks,  Barclay  saw  no  choice  but  to  fight  at  once. 
Early  on  the  morning  of  September  9,  the  British 
fleet  sailed  to  meet  the  American  squadron,  which 
was  anchored  at  the  mouth  of  the  Sandusky  River. 
Barclay  had  six  vessels  with  sixty-three  guns, 
and  probably  about  four  hundred  and  fifty  men. 
Perry  had  nine  vessels  with  fifty-four  guns,  and 
about  the  same  number  of  available  men.  His 
guns,  however,  were  much  heavier,  and  his 
vessels  larger. 

At  daybreak  of  September  10,  Perry's  look- 
out discovered  the  approaching  British  fleet;  the 
American  ships  at  once  weighed  anchor,  in  twelve 
minutes  they  were  under  sail  and  standing  toward 
the  enemy.  The  wind  was  light  and  the  lake 
calm,  so  that  both  sides  found  difficulty  in  getting 
into  position,  but  by  noon  they  were  drawn  up 
for  battle.  The  British  vessels  were  in  a  single 
column,  the  American  in  a  somewhat  more  irregu- 


184         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

lar  formation,  and  each  vessel  opposed  one  of  its 
own  tonnage  and  build  in  the  enemy's  fleet. 
Barclay  commanded  the  Detroit,  a  ship  of  four 
hundred  and  ninety  tons  carrying  nineteen  guns, 
and  opposite  him  was  Perry's  flagship,  the  Law- 
rence, with  twenty  guns.  At  a  quarter  before 
twelve  the  British  opened  fire,  and  the  Americans 
replied. 

Finding  the  British  fire  at  long  range  very 
destructive,  especially  to  his  own  vessel,  Perry 
set  more  sail  and  passed  the  word  by  hail  of 
trumpet  for  the  whole  line  to  close  up  and  ad- 
vance nearer  the  enemy.  For  two  hours  the 
fleets  manoeuvred  in  this  position,  the  Lawrence 
within  two  hundred  and  fifty  yards  of  the  Detroit 
and  both  vessels  pouring  a  heavy  fire  into  each 
other.  A  second  vessel,  the  S^ueen  Charlotte, 
came  to  the  support  of  Barclay,  and  Perry's  flag- 
ship, after  sustaining  the  action  for  over  two 
hours,  was  seriously  disabled.  Every  gun  was 
rendered  useless,  the  greater  part  of  the  crew 
killed  or  wounded,  and  the  rigging  shot  away. 
At  2.30  the  English  commander  saw  the  Law- 
rence drop  from  her  position  and  a  small  boat 
pass  from  her  to  the  Niagara,  a  vessel  under  com- 
mand of  Lieutenant  Elliot,  which  had  been  at 


The  Conquest  of  Lake  Erie  185 

some  distance  from  the  main  engagement  and  was 
at  this  time  comparatively  fresh.  As  Barclay 
wrote  in  his  official  report,  "  The  American  com- 
modore, seeing  that  as  yet  the  day  was  against 
him,  made  a  noble  and,  alas  !  too  successful  an 
effort  to  regain  it;  for  he  bore  up  [in  the  Ni- 
agara] and  supported  by  his  small  vessels, 
passed  within  pistol-shot  and  took  a  raking  posi- 
tion on  our  bow/*  Up  to  this  time  the  result 
of  the  action  had  been  in  doubt.  For  some  rea- 
son the  portion  of  the  fleet  under  Elliot  had  pur- 
sued an  independent  course,  and  Perry  with  the 
vessels  nearest  him  had  been  too  hard  pressed. 
A  bitter  dispute  as  to  the  cause  of  this  condition 
was  waged  by  Elliot's  friends  in  the  ensuing  years 
after  the  close  of  the  war.  Whatever  the  reason, 
it  was  evident  to  all  that  the  American  force  was 
not  in  its  most  effective  position  because  so  many 
of  the  vessels  were  fighting  at  long  range  instead 
of  at  close.  When  Elliot  came  up  near  enough 
to  the  disabled  flagship  to  allow  Perry  to  go  on 
board,  the  advantage  was  for  the  first  time  on 
the  American  side.  Perry  was  able  to  bear  down 
on  the  Detroit  and  pour  into  her  volleys  of  shot 
so  that,  with  American  vessels  on  every  side  aid- 
ing in  the  attack,  she  soon  became  completely 


1 86         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

disabled.  The  topmasts  and  rigging  were  cut 
away,  the  hull  was  shattered,  and  the  vessel  be- 
came unmanageable.  Within  half  an  hour  the 
British  commander  was  forced  to  strike  his  flag 
and  surrender. 

It  had  been  a  desperate  alternative  for  Com- 
modore Perry  to  venture  into  a  small  boat  and 
transfer  his  flag  from  one  ship  to  another.  By 
his  personal  action  in  thus  rushing  his  own  vessel 
in  at  the  crisis  and  exposing  himself  to  a  fusillade 
from  the  enemy  for  several  minutes  before  he 
could  make  any  reply  to  it,  Perry  had  won  the 
battle  for  the  Americans.  He  determined  to  re- 
ceive the  surrender  on  his  original  flagship,  the 
Lawrence,  at  whose  peak  had  been  flying  through- 
out the  battle  the  words  spoken  a  few  months 
before  by  the  hero  for  whom  the  vessel  was 
named,  the  dying  commander  of  the  Chesapeake, 
"  Don't  give  up  the  ship."  Perry  returned  to 
the  ship  and  the  English  officers  came  to  him 
there.  Each  presented  his  sword,  and  in  reply 
Perry  bowed  and  requested  that  their  side-arms 
be  retained  by  the  officers.  The  deck  of  the 
Lawrence  was  covered  with  dead  and  wounded. 
On  both  sides  the  battle  had  been  very  hard- 
fought,  and  the  loss  of  life,  both  of  officers  and 


The  Conquest  of  Lake  Erie  187 

men,  was  very  heavy.  Out  of  one  hundred  and 
three  men  on  the  Lawrence  twenty-two  had  been 
killed  and  sixty-one  wounded.  On  both  the  flag- 
ships every  officer  save  Perry  was  killed  or 
wounded,  even  Barclay  being  seriously  injured, 
and  the  loss  on  these  vessels  was  probably  four- 
fifths  of  the  men  disabled  or  killed.  When  the 
ceremony  of  surrender  was  over,  Perry  tore  off 
the  back  of  an  old  letter,  and  using  his  hat  for  a 
writing-desk,  wrote  to  General  Harrison,  stationed 
with  reinforcements  on  the  Sandusky  River : 
"  We  have  met  the  enemy,  and  they  are  ours ; 
two  ships,  two  brigs,  one  schooner,  and  one 
sloop." 

Perry's  victory  was  immediately  followed  up 
both  by  himself  and  by  General  Harrison.  Within 
a  week  the  remnant  of  the  fleet  was  ready  to  con- 
vey land  forces  to  Maiden,  where  they  disem- 
barked on  the  27th  of  September.  The  timidity 
and  incompetence  of  the  British  general,  Proctor, 
gave  the  Americans  a  great  advantage.  To  the 
utter  scorn  of  Tecumseh  and  his  Indians,  who 
were  supporting  the  British,  General  Proctor 
evacuated  Maiden,  Detroit,  and  Sandwich  without 
a  stroke  in  their  defence,  and  retired  along  the 
road  to  Lake  Ontario  even  before  the  Americans 


1 88          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

landed.  With  such  a  start  Harrison  thought 
that  the  English  with  their  thousand  horses  would 
be  out  of  his  reach,  but  he  prepared  to  follow 
them.  This  Proctor  seems  not  to  have  included 
in  the  range  of  possibilities. 

By  easy  marches  the  British  proceeded  to 
Chatham,  fifty  miles  from  Sandwich  on  the  River 
Thames.  Here' Proctor  halted  the  army  while 
he  himself  went  on  to  the  Moravian  town  twenty- 
six  miles  beyond.  The  American  army  appeared, 
and  the  British  tried  to  follow  their  commander 
to  Chatham.  The  organization  of  the  whole 
army  was  by  this  time  completely  demoralized. 
They  had,  however,  no  choice  but  to  turn  and 
fight,  as  the  younger  officers  and  soldiers  had 
long  desired*.  The  British  were  so  stationed  as 
to  give  the  advantage  of  position  to  their  oppo- 
nents ;  and  the  American  force  was  strengthened 
by  a  mounted  regiment  commanded  by  Richard 
Johnson,  who  had  won  a  great  reputation  for 
himself  and  his  men  in  previous  battles  on  the 
frontier.  The  Americans  lost  only  fifteen  men 
in  the  engagement,  with  thirty  wounded.*  The 
British  list  of  dead  and  wounded  was  also  short, 
but  nearly  five  hundred  were  taken  prisoners,  and 
their  supply  of  provisions  and  ammunition  fell 


The  Conquest  of  Lake  Erie  189 

into  the  hands  of  the  Americans.  Only  two  hun- 
dred of  this  whole  division  of  the  British  army 
returned  to  report  at  headquarters  a  month  later. 
The  Indian  warrior,  Tecumseh,  was  killed  in  this 
battle,  and  with  his  death  the  remote  prospect  of 
an  Indian  confederacy  was  gone.  After  these 
two  victories  the  western  Indians  fell  away  from 
their  alliance  with  the  British  and  took  no 
active  part  in  the  war. 

The  last  year  of  the  war,  the  year  1814,  was 
marked  by  constant  and  active  operations  on  Lake 
Ontario  and  about  Niagara.  The  naval  move- 
ments were  not  particularly  effective  on  the  Ameri- 
can side,  nor  did  they  win  great  results.  The 
possession  of  the  Niagara  River  was  sharply 
contested,  and  the  American  troops  distinguished 
themselves  by  their  bravery  at  the  battles  of 
Chippewa  Creek  and  Lundy's  Lane.  Cut  off 
from  any  other  lake  position,  the  British  could 
concentrate  their  forces  at  this  point  and  throw 
the  Americans  on  the  defensive.  These  battles 
concerned,  nevertheless,  only  a  small  portion 
of  the  Great  Lakes,  which  were  again  the 
northern  boundary  of  the  United  States.  By 
Perry's  victory  on  Lake  Erie,  the  subsequent 
recovery  of  the  Detroit  River,  and  the  defeat 


190         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

of  the  British  army  at  the  Thames,  Lake  Erie 
and  the  whole  Northwest  were  saved  to  the 
United  States.  The  close  of  the  war  by  the 
treaty  of  Ghent  in  the  winter  of  1814  brought 
to  the  lake  frontier  a  well-earned  and  a  lasting 
peace. 


CHAPTER  XV 

GENERAL    LEWIS    CASS    AND    REORGANIZATION 

A  PERIOD  of  conflict  always  leaves  behind 
it  changed  and  unsettled  conditions. 
Between  the  close  of  a  war  and  the 
final  readjustment  of  affairs  leading  up  to  a  set- 
tled and  permanent  life,  there  must  be  a  time  of 
reorganization.  Into  this  period  of  reconstruc- 
tion the  western  territory  about  the  Great  Lakes 
passed  at  the  close  of  the  War  of  1812.  Since 
the  Ordinance  of  1787  the  Northwest  Territory 
had  been  subdivided.  Ohio  had  become  a  state 
in  1 802,  and  the  region  west  of  it  had  all  been  in- 
cluded in  a  territory  under  the  general  name  of  In- 
diana, of  which  section  William  Henry  Harrison 
was  the  first  governor.  From  Indiana,  in  its  turn, 
Michigan  was  set  off  in  1805,  w^tn  William  Hull 
as  its  first  governor.  On  Hull's  retirement  from 
public  life,  after  the  surrender  of  Detroit,  Colonel 
Lewis  Cass  was  appointed  governor  of  Michigan 
Territory.  As  the  man  who  had  most  influence 


192          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

on  the  Northwest  during  these  years  of  recon- 
struction, Governor  Cass  deserves  detailed  notice. 

Born  in  Exeter,  New  Hampshire,  in  1782,  Lewis 
Cass  was  the  son  of  a  soldier  of  the  Revolution. 
During  his  son's  boyhood  Major  Cass,  the  father, 
was  with  Anthony  Wayne  or  in  command  of 
Fort  Hamilton,  and  after  the  peace  of  Greenville 
he  brought  his  family,  as  did  so  many  of  the 
soldiers,  to  the  rich  country  through  which  he  had 
marched  in  war  time.  The  young  man  divided 
his  time  between  Marietta,  where  he  began  the 
study  of  law,  and  the  frontier,  where  his  father  was 
hewing  a  home  and  making  a  living  out  of  the 
wilderness.  Under  the  state  constitution  of  Ohio 
the  first  certificate  of  admission  to  the  bar  was 
given  in  1802  to  Lewis  Cass.  In  the  school  of 
the  county  court  the  young  lawyer  gained  a  first- 
hand knowledge  of  the  practice  of  the  law  and 
an  understanding  of  the  people  of  the  frontier  and 
how  to  deal  with  them,  both  of  which  served  him 
well  in  his  governorship.  Even  before  he  reached 
the  proper  age  of  eligibility  he  was  sent  to  the 
Ohio  legislature,  and  at  the  outbreak  of  the  War 
of  1812  he  was  given  a  colonel's  commission. 

Cass  was  one  of  the  three  Ohio  colonels  who 
served  with  Hull  in  the  ill-starred  Detroit  expe- 


General  Lewis  Cass  and  Reorganization      193 

dition.  Indeed,  he  led  one  of  the  few  successful 
minor  charges  of  that  campaign.  To  his  great 
indignation  he  was  included  by  his  general  in  that 
surrender,  although  he  was  not  at  the  fort.  For 
some  months  he  was  prisoner  of  war  on  parole. 
As  soon  as  he  was  released  he  joined  Harrison, 
under  whom  he  did  such  efficient  service  that 
Harrison  left  him  after  the  battle  of  the  Thames 
in  command  of  Detroit  and  the  northwest  fron- 
tier. The  President  soon  appointed  Cass  gov- 
ernor of  Michigan  Territory,  which  then  included 
only  the  lower  peninsula  of  the  present  state,  but 
to  which  the  territory  that  is  now  Wisconsin  was 
added  in  1818  under  the  name  of  the  Huron 
District. 

Indiana  became  a  state  two  years  after  the  close 
of  the  war,  but  as  governor  of  Michigan  Territory 
and  superintendent  of  Indian  affairs  General  Cass 
had  control  of  all  Indian  posts  in  the  Northwest, 
as  well  as  of  the  whole  of  Michigan,  Wisconsin, 
and  northern  Illinois.  Illinois  became  a  state 
in  1818,  but  at  that  time  the  only  recognized 
settlements  were  in  the  southern  portion  of  the 
territory,  and  the  region  about  Chicago  was  prac- 
tically left  to  the  care  of  General  Cass.  The 
management  of  this  vast  territory  presented  many 


194         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

difficulties.  The  governor's  immediate  residence, 
Detroit,  was  four-fifths  Canadian,  and  of  this 
population  a  large  proportion  was  French.  It 
was  only  fifty  years  since  Major  Gladwin  had 
taken  possession  of  a  Detroit  that  was  wholly 
French,  and  when  the  Americans  took  command 
in  1796  they  had  found  a  large  predominance  of 
French-Canadians.  These  settlers  were  in  the 
best  of  times  poor  farmers,  and  in  war  times  they 
had  stopped  all  attempts  to  cultivate  the  land. 
Governor  Cass  found  among  them  the  most 
absolute  ignorance  of  the  rudimentary  prin- 
ciples of  farming  that  he  had  ever  encountered. 
They  used  one  piece  of  ground,  without  the  least 
attempt  to  fertilize,  until  it  was  exhausted,  and 
then  proceeded  to  another.  As  these  settlers  of 
Detroit  were  typical  of  the  more  scattered  inhabit- 
ants of  the  region,  and  as  the  Indians  were 
almost  entirely  dependent  on  the  gifts  and  sup- 
plies of  the  ruling  people,  Cass  found  himself 
confronted  by  the  problem  of  how  to  feed  a  starv- 
ing territory.  For  its  immediate  need  he  sought 
and  obtained  government  bounties  for  the  people. 
For  the  remedy  of  the  condition  he  did  every- 
thing in  his  power  to  stimulate  settlement,  urging 
the  government  to  survey  the  land  and  allot  por- 


General   Lewis  Cass  and  Reorganization     195 

tions  for  sale.  In  this  he  was  hindered  by  the 
false  reports  of  the  first  surveyors,  who  for  some 
reason  represented  the  whole  of  Michigan  as  so 
swampy,  barren,  or  otherwise  unfit  for  cultivation 
that  there  could  be  no  incentive  to  immediate 
settlement.  This,  be  it  remembered,  was  said  of 
Michigan,  whose  rich  bottom-lands,  fertile  prai- 
ries, and  timber  tracts  were  soon  to  be  so  pro- 
ductive and  whose  orchards  were  to  become 
among  the  greatest  fruit  producers  of  the  states. 
Cass  did  everything  in  his  power  to  counteract 
these  statements  and  to  further  immigration. 
Occupation  of  the  land  by  thrifty  settlers  would 
solve  the  difficulties  by  making  the  inhabitants 
independent  as  they  became  capable  of  producing 
what  they  needed,  and  would  also  lessen  their 
isolation  by  creating  lines  of  communication  with 
the  East.  In  these  efforts  he  was  successful.  A 
public  sale  of  lands  was  held  in  1818,  and  by  1820 
the  population  had  nearly  doubled  since  before 
the  war.  The  opening  of  the  Erie  Canal  in  1825 
brought  in  a  period  of  rapid  immigration  in  which 
Cass  began  to  see  the  fulfilment  of  his  hopes. 
The  population  jumped  from  nine  thousand  in 
1820  to  thirty-two  thousand  in  1830.  This 
came  just  before  he  was  called  to  the  position  of 


196          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

Secretary  of  War  at  Washington.  During  his 
period  of  national  service  he  had  the  satisfaction 
of  seeing  his  territory  flooded  with  newcomers,  till 
in  1837  it  entered  the  Union  as  a  state  with  one 
hundred  and  seventy-five  thousand  inhabitants. 
It  was  due  to  the  statesmanship  of  its  governor 
that  Michigan  Territory  was  so  well-ordered  and 
well-developed  a  region  and  was  therefore  so  soon 
ready  for  statehood.  He  educated  the  original 
settlers  to  self-government,  organized  courts  and 
legislative  assemblies  and  guided  their  policies, 
and  furthered  the  cause  of  public  education. 
During  the  eighteen  years  of  his  governorship  he 
devoted  himself  to  such  service  with  a  zeal  that 
won  immediate  results. 

In  his  double  position  as  governor  and  super- 
intendent of  Indian  affairs,  Cass  did  much  else  for 
the  western  lake  region.  Even  after  the  cessation 
of  hostilities,  he  found  the  British  attitude  hostile 
and  aggravating.  This  showed  itself  in  two  ways. 
The  British  were  inclined  to  ignore  the  rights  of 
the  United  States  citizens  and  to  interfere  with 
their  liberty  when  the  proximity  of  the  two 
nations  brought  up  any  disputed  question  ;  they 
also  stirred  the  Indians  to  hostility.  Governor 
Cass  stood  out  boldly,  insisting  that  the  United 


General   Lewis  Cass  and  Reorganization      197 

States  must  be  treated  according  to  the  customs 
of  international  law  between  two  equal  powers. 
In  time  the  British  came  to  realize  that  they  were 
dealing  with  a  nation,  not  with  a  detached  and 
feeble  territory.  Governor  Cass  could  not  handle 
so  openly  the  British  instigation  of  the  Indians 
to  hostility  toward  the  United  States  and  its 
western  settlers.  There  was  no  law  to  prevent 
the  distribution  of  sixty  tons  of  presents  among 
the  Indians  who  gathered  at  Maiden  from  the 
American  as  well  as  from  the  Canadian  side  of 
the  river.  The  British  did  not  realize  that  the 
time  had  come  for  them  to  give  up  their  guardian- 
ship of  all  Indian  tribes  who  did  not  live  within 
their  lawful  jurisdiction. 

In  the  conduct  of  Indian  affairs  Governor  Cass 
showed  himself  skilled  as  no  leader  had  been  since 
the  days  of  the  wise  French  explorers.  The 
Indians  had  never  forgotten  the  French  mission- 
aries. "  Seven  generations,"  said  a  Chippewa 
chief,  "  have  passed  since  the  Frenchmen  came  to 
these  falls  (Sault  Ste.  Marie),  but  we  have  not 
forgotten  them.  Just,  very  just,  were  they  to  us." 
This  spirit  of  fairness  now  returned  in  Governor 
Cass,  who  combined  with  it  an  insight  into  In- 
dian character,  a  patience  that  enabled  him  to  deal 


198          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

with  the  savages,  and  an  energy  which  made  him 
go  to  endless  trouble  to  arrange  matters  with 
them.  The  work  of  this  wonderful  man  held  off 
raids  and  massacres,  —  if  not  open  and  continued 
war,  —  which  would  have  retarded  settlement  in 
this  exposed  wilderness  for  many  years.  If  the 
white  men  were  to  occupy  the  greater  part  of  the 
country,  agreements  must  be  made  and  kept  with 
the  Indians.  Cass  recognized  this  as  his  cardinal 
principle,  and  began  to  act  on  it  even  before  the 
close  of  the  war.  He  first  made  treaties  with  the 
Indians  near  Detroit.  From  this  centre  the  circle 
widened  until  it  included  the  whole  of  his  vast 
territory  and  parts  of  more  settled  regions.  At 
St.  Mary's  in  Ohio,  at  Saginaw  in  Michigan,  and 
at  Chicago  in  Illinois,  he  concluded  treaties  which 
brought  to  the  United  States  vast  stretches  of 
valuable  territory. 

With  the  permission  of  the  government  Cass 
organized  an  expedition  to  go  into  the  remote 
sections  of  its  northwestern  possessions,  investi- 
gate their  resources,  and  come  into  friendly  rela- 
tions with  the  Indians.  Of  this  picturesque  and 
important  expedition  made  by  twenty  Americans 
into  the  then  unknown  Lake  Superior  country 
Mr.  Schoolcraft,  one  of  his  scientific  companions, 


General  Lewis  Cass  and  Reorganization     199 

has  left  us  a  full  account.  In  every  transaction 
the  figure  of  Cass  stands  out  strong  and  forceful. 
At  Sault  Ste.  Marie  he  wanted  to  obtain  a  piece 
of  ground  which  through  old  British  and  French 
treaties  the  Indians  had  previously  admitted  to 
belong  to  the  white  men.  Adorned  with  British 
medals  the  Indians  greeted  him  with  an  indepen- 
dence of  word  and  gesture  that  soon  became  open 
rudeness  and  impudence.  Retiring  from  the 
council  the  chiefs  ran  up  the  British  flag  on  their 
lodge  and  cleared  the  room  in  preparation  for 
battle.  Governor  Cass,  with  a  single  interpreter, 
walked  into  the  Indian  camp,  tore  down  the 
British  flag,  and  faced  the  astonished  savages. 
The  Americans  were  studious,  he  said,  to  render 
justice  and  promote  peace  with  the  Indians,  but 
the  flag  was  the  distinguishing  token  of  national 
power,  and  two  could  not  fly  over  the  same  spot. 
The  Indians  were  forbidden  to  raise  any  flag  but 
the  American,  and  if  they  should  the  United 
States  would  put  strong  feet  on  their  necks  and 
crush  them  to  earth.  With  these  words  he  turned 
and  walked  out  of  the  lodge  with  the  British  flag 
in  his  hand.  In  a  few  hours  the  Indians  signed 
the  treaty,  and  the  expedition  proceeded  on  its 
way. 


2oo         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

At  the  request  of  Cass  mineralogists  and  geol- 
ogists had  been  sent  with  him,  and  they  made 
such  discoveries  as  he  had  expected  of  copper  and 
other  minerals.  So  valuable  were  they  that  the 
attention  of  the  whole  United  States  was  turned 
toward  this  rich  region.  Part  of  the  company, 
led  by  Cass,  returned  by  way  of  Chicago,  a  village 
of  only  ten  or  twelve  houses  outside  the  limits  of 
a  well-garrisoned  fort,  but  with  a  location  in  what 
seemed  to  Cass  "  the  most  fertile  and  beautiful 
country  that  could  be  imagined." 

Six  years  later  Cass  was  back  on  Lake  Supe- 
rior making  on  the  site  of  Duluth  important 
treaties  with  the  tribes  of  Wisconsin  and  Minne- 
sota. In  all  these  treaties  with  the  Indians  he 
insisted  on  three  points.  The  chiefs  should 
understand  fully  what  they  were  doing ;  just 
remuneration  should  be  made  by  the  Americans ; 
and  the  promises  made  should  be  faithfully  ob- 
served on  both  sides.  The  flag  that  he  carried 
into  the  lake  region  remained  during  his  adminis- 
tration the  symbol  of  justice  and  honor,  and  won 
the  respect  of  all. 


CHAPTER   XVI 

THE    BLACK    HAWK    WAR 

THE   settlement  of  northern  Illinois  and 
Wisconsin  by  American  colonists  brought 
on  in   1832  the  last  serious  Indian  out- 
break in  the  lake  region.     The  white  men  had 
been    pushing    the    Indians    farther    and    farther 
west.     On  the  banks  of  the  Mississippi  the  red 
men    turned    and    made  a  desperate    attempt  to 
keep    possession    of  the    lands    which    held    the 
homes  and  the  graves  of  their  ancestors. 

Between  Rock  River  in  Illinois  and  the  Wis- 
consin River  there  lay  on  the  eastern  bank  of 
the  Mississippi  a  region  which  had  been  known 
to  the  white  men  ever  since  the  visit  of  Nicholas 
Perrotin  1690  because  of  its  extensive  deposits  of 
lead.  Mines  had  been  worked  there  by  the 
Indians  and  Frenchmen  for  two  centuries  and 
had  yielded  a  considerable  output,  which  had 
been  bought  by  French-Canadian  traders  and  in 
later  years  by  the  British.  The  United  States 


2O2.         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 


concluded  in  1804  a  treaty  with  the  Sauk  and 
Fox  Indians,  who  occupied  this  country,  by 
which  they  ceded  to  the  Americans  the  territory 
east  of  the  Mississippi  River  from  the  mouth  of 
the  Illinois  at  the  south  to  the  mouth  of  the 


FROM 

IAKE  MICHIGAN 

TO 

THE  MISSISSIPPI 


Wisconsin  at  the  north.  It  had  been  agreed  that 
so  long  as  the  lands  remained  the  public  property 
of  the  United  States  the  Indians  might  live  and 
hunt  there,  but  when  they  were  bought  by 
settlers  the  Indians  must  move. 

American  mining  settlements  sprang  up  after 
the  close  of  the  War  of  1812,  and  by  1827  an 
established  coach  road,  known  as  Kellogg's  Trail, 


The  Black  Hawk  War  203 

ran  from  Peoria  one  hundred  and  twenty  miles 
north  to  Galena,  which  was  in  the  heart  of  the 
mining  country.  Along  this  road  were  occasional 
groups  of  cabins,  while  on  either  side  trails  ran 
off  into  the  wilderness  which  would  have  led  the 
traveller  who  followed  them  to  solitary  home- 
steads and  well-ordered  farms.  In  a  rich  and 
fertile  tract  at  the  mouth  of  Rock  River  stood  the 
chief  village  of  the  Sauks.  It  was  one  of  the 
largest  and  most  prosperous  Indian  towns  on 
the  continent,  with  more  than  five  hundred  fami- 
lies, and  was  besides  the  principal  cemetery  of 
the  nation.  Squatters  seized  the  Indian  fields, 
built  their  huts  on  their  clearings,  and  stole  their 
harvests.  Until  the  lands  were  formally  sold  the 
Indians  had  a  right  there,  and  their  complaints 
were  just.  In  1828,  however,  the  site  of  the  vil- 
lage was  sold,  and  the  tribes  were  given  notice  to 
leave.  Keokuk,  the  chief  of  the  Sauks,  crossed 
the  Mississippi  with  the  majority  of  the  tribe  and 
counselled  the  rest  to  yield  peaceably.  A  consid- 
erable number  of  the  Indians  remained  in  the  set- 
tlement, living  on  the  high  bluff  which  has  since 
been  known  as  Black  Hawk's  Watch  Tower,  and 
cultivating  the  few  fields  which  remained  to  them. 
Black  Hawk  was  one  of  the  Indians  who  did 


204         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

not  share  Keokuk's  submissive  temper  of  mind. 
He  was  a  warrior  about  sixty  years  of  age,  who 
seems  always  to  have  been  a  restless  and  discon- 
tented member  of  the  tribe.  He  was  a  tall, 
spare  man,  with  pinched  features,  high  cheek- 
bones, and  a  prominent  Roman  nose.  His 
.black  eyes  were  piercing;  he  had  practically  no 
eyebrows,  and  his  hair  had  been  plucked  out 
save  for  a  single  scalp-lock,  in  which  on  occasions 
was  fastened  a  bunch  of  eagle  feathers.  He  was 
a  striking  figure,  and  his  history  bore  out  in 
interest  his  appearance.  He  had  begun  his  war- 
like career  in  early  youth.  Before  he  was  fifteen 
he  had  won  in  his  tribe  the  rank  of  a  brave,  and 
at  that  age  the  scalping  of  an  enemy  had  gained 
him  the  coveted  right  to  paint,  to  wear  feathers, 
and  to  dance  the  war-dance.  Since  that  time  he 
had«  been  involved  in  every  tribal  skirmish  that 
had  taken  place,  and  he  had  played  a  prominent 
part  in  the  white  men's  wars. 

In  the  unsettled  period  before  the  War  of  1812, 
Black  Hawk  had  gathered  about  him  a  group  of 
two  hundred  young  warriors,  who  won  for  them- 
selves in  the  war  the  name  of  the  "  British  Band/' 
from  their  support  of  the  British  troops.  He 
had  fought  at  the  battle  of  Frenchtown  on  the 


BLACK  HAWK 


The  Black  Hawk  War  205 

River  Raisin,  at  the  battle  of  the  Thames  under 
Tecumseh,  and  after  the  latter's  death  he  returned 
to  Illinois  and  carried  on  there  a  border  warfare 
which  was  only  ended  by  his  signing  at  St.  Louis 
in  1 8 1 6  a  treaty  of  peace.  Since  that  time  he  had 
made  the  Rock  River  village  his  headquarters, 
and  when  the  white  men  began  to  take  up  his 
lands,  his  smouldering  hatred  of  the  Americans 
blazed  out.  Returning  with  a  band  of  warriors 
from  the  winter  hunting  season  of  1831,  he  was 
warned  off  his  land.  He  refused  to  cross  the 
Mississippi  River,  and  appealed  to  the  Indians 
to  defend  the  graves  of  their  ancestors.  In 
spite  of  Keokuk's  remonstrances  the  best  young 
men  of  the  Sauk  and  Fox  tribes  flocked  to  his 
standard,  and  his  threats  excited  such  alarm 
among  the  settlers  that  Governor  Reynolds  of 
Illinois  issued  a  call  for  volunteers  to  assist  the 
regular  troops  in  guarding  the  frontier.  There 
was  a  prompt  response,  and  when  the  troops 
reached  Black  Hawk's  village  the  Indians  with- 
drew during  the  night  to  the  west  side  of  the 
river  and  signed  a  treaty  never  to  return  to  their 
former  homes  without  the  express  permission  of 
the  United  States  authorities. 

Black    Hawk   did    not   abide    by    this    treaty. 


206         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

During  the  winter  of  1832  he  recruited  a  large 
force,  and  in  the  spring  he  crossed  the  Mississippi 
at  a  point  just  south  of  his  former  village,  and 
began  a  march  up  the  Rock  River  Valley.  This 
invasion  of  the  state  by  a  hostile  band  of  savages 
excited  great  alarm  along  the  frontier.  The 
settlers  came  in  from  their  lonely  farms 
and  built  about  the  larger  villages  stockades  and 
defences.  A  call  for  volunteers  was  issued,  and 
the  enthusiastic  response  was  a  surprise,  even  to 
the  governor  who  summoned  them. 

One  of  the  first  to  enlist  was  Abraham  Lincoln, 
an  Illinois  citizen  of  two  years'  standing.  He 
had  come  with  his  family  in  his  seventh  year  from 
Kentucky  to  Indiana  and  thence  in  1830  to  the 
newer  settlements  of  Illinois.  He  was  twenty- 
three  years  old,  and  was  a  tall,  sturdy  backwoods- 
man, who  was  to  prove  himself  in  the  wrestling 
matches  that  were  the  soldiers'  pastime,  the 
strongest  man  but  one  in  the  whole  army.  He 
was  at  once  chosen  captain  of  his  company,  an 
honor  which  brought  him  more  gratification  than 
most  of  his  greater  successes.  The  volunteers 
were  organized  into  four  regiments,  and  started 
to  follow  Black  Hawk  up  the  Rock  River. 
The  command  of  four  hundred  regulars  was  given 


The  Black  Hawk  War  207 

to  Colonel  Zachary  Taylor,  afterwards  President  of 
the  United  States  ;  and  during  the  months  of  this 
war  there  served  in  the  army  Robert  Anderson, 
the  defender  of  Sumter,  Winfield  Scott,  Albert 
Sidney  Johnston,  the  Confederate  hero,  and 
Jefferson  Davis.  It  was  a  distinguished  group  of 
men  who  responded  in  their  youth  to  the  call  of 
their  country. 

The  marching  was  difficult.  There  were  no 
roads  or  bridges,  only  marshy  trails  and  streams 
swollen  into  torrents  by  the  spring  thaws.  But 
the  hardy  backwoodsmen  were  used  to  such  con- 
ditions. They  marched  steadily  on,  and  when 
they  had  gone  some  ninety  miles  up  Rock  River 
to  Dixon's  Ferry  halted  to  await  the  arrival  of 
General  Atkinson  with  the  regular  troops  and  the 
loads  of  provisions.  They  found  there  two  bat- 
talions of  horsemen,  under  the  command  of 
Majors  Stillman  and  Bailey,  which  had  been 
gathered  in  the  upper  country.  They  had  had 
no  long  march  to  weary  them,  but  were  impatient 
to  get  a  chance  at  the  enemy.  They  set  off  as 
scouts  on  a  dark,  threatening  morning  in  May, 
with  orders  to  coerce  what  Indians  they  met  into 
submission.  "  I  thought,"  says  the  governor  in 
his  memoirs,  "  they  might  discover  the  enemy." 
And  they  did. 


208         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

Black  Hawk  had  been  urging  the  tribes  of  the 
Rock  River  region  to  join  him,  but  had  received 
so  little  encouragement  that  he  was  almost  pre- 
pared to  make  peace  with  the  advancing  army. 
He  was  now  a  little  way  up  the  river  with  a  party 
of  forty  or  fifty  warriors,  a  body-guard  selected 
from  his  eight  hundred  men,  who  were  en- 
camped seven  miles  beyond.  As  the  chief  sat 
at  supper  on  the  evening  of  the  I4th  of  May,  he 
was  told  that  a  small  party  of  white  horsemen 
was  making  camp  near  by.  The  creek  on  whose 
banks  the  Americans  had  halted  was  lined  .with 
tall  willows,  which  made  a  good  protection  for  the 
camp.  The  vanguard  of  the  two  brigades  had 
stopped,  tied  their  horses  to  the  trees,  and  begun 
to  build  fires  for  supper  when  three  Indians  ap- 
peared on  a  height  nearly  a  mile  away.  It  after- 
wards proved  that  these  Indians  were  messengers 
from  Black  Hawk  and  were  bearing  a  white  flag  of 
truce.  The  scouts  at  sight  of  the  Indians  rushed 
out  and  seized  them.  Black  Hawk  and  his  men, 
watching  at  a  distance,  saw  their  men  captured  and 
prepared  hastily  to  meet  and  attack  the  whites. 
The  squads  of  soldiers  who  had  started  in  the 
chase  were  scattered  without  any  regular  order 
along  half  a  mile  of  the  valley.  When  the  fore- 


The  Black  Hawk  War  209 

most  of  the  pursuers  came  upon  Black  Hawk  and 
his  men  hidden  behind  a  growth  of  brush,  the 
savages  dashed  out  upon  them  with  wild  war- 
whoops.  The  soldiers  thought  that  eight  hun- 
dred Indians  were  behind  their  leader,  and  scat- 
tered in  every  direction.  Their  officers  tried  to 
rally  them,  but  the  force  was  disorganized.  The 
men  leaped  on  their  horses  and  rode  away.  The 
Indians,  astonished  at  this  sudden  development, 
feared  that  they  were  being  led  into  an  ambush ; 
but  they  pursued  the  white  men,  killing  those 
whom  they  overtook.  At  one  or  two  places 
companies  of  soldiers  turned  and  made  a  gallant 
fight,  but  most  of  them  escaped  on  their  swift 
horses.  By  twos  and  threes  they  straggled  into 
the  camp  at  Dixon's  Ferry,  twenty-five  miles 
away,  with  a  story  of  defeat  that  spread  a  panic 
over  the  whole  frontier.  The  army  marched 
next  day  to  the  scene  of  the  surprise ;  but  Black 
Hawk  and  his  men  were  gone,  and  it  was  not 
thought  wise  to  pursue  them  farther  north  with- 
out a  better  supply  of  provisions.  The  unex- 
pected and  easy  victory  had  encouraged  Black 
Hawk  and  had  brought  many  Indians  of  other 
tribes  to  his  side. 

A  reign  of  terror   followed   Stillman's  defeat. 


2io         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

Scalping  parties  organized  by  Black  Hawk  cov- 
ered the  frontier,  making  raids  on  the  exposed 
northern  settlements.  Many  on  both  sides  lost 
their  lives,  for  small  parties  of  American  settlers 
made  gallant  defences  in  their  scattered  villages 
and  held  the  Indians  back.  Three  weeks  from 
the  time  of  the  first  attack  a  new  army  of  volun- 
teers, four  thousand  strong,  took  the  field.  They 
marched  to  Dixon's  Ferry  and  then  plunged  into 
the  wilderness,  taking  every  precaution  as  they 
proceeded  into  the  enemy's  country  to  guard 
against  surprise.  On  the  joth  of  June  they 
crossed  the  Illinois  border  near  the  present  city 
of  Beloit,  Wisconsin,  and  came  upon  abandoned 
camps  and  other  signs  of  the  retreating  Indians. 

The  progress  through  the  wilderness  of  Wis- 
consin was  slow  and  difficult.  Day  after  day  the 
troops  pushed  on,  wading  up  to  their  armpits  in 
mud  and  water,  or  hewing  away  the  trees  and 
underbrush  that  barred  their  course.  After  three 
weeks  they  came  up  with  the  last  of  the  fugitives. 
Passing  through  a  forest  where  stands  to-day  the 
city  of  Madison,  they  came  to  the  shores  of  the 
Wisconsin  River,  and  there  they  fought  the  bat- 
tle of  Wisconsin  Heights.  The  loss  of  life  among 
the  Indians  was  heavy;  among  the  Americans, 


The  Black  Hawk  War  211 

light.  During  the  night  after  the  battle,  the 
startled  soldiers  sitting  in  their  camp  heard  from 
the  direction  of  the  Indian  encampment  a  loud, 
clear  voice  speaking  in  an  unknown  tongue. 
They  feared  that  some  chief  was  directing  his 
men  to  descend  upon  the  camp  and  make  a  night 
attack.  After  a  time,  however,  the  voice  ceased 
and  nothing  more  was  thought  of  the  incident. 
It  proved  afterwards  that  this  was  the  voice  of  an 
orator  sent  by  Black  Hawk  to  beg  for  peace.  He 
had  used  the  Winnebago  tongue,  and  as  the 
members  of  that  tribe  had  left  the  camp  that  very 
day,  no  one  understood  him.  Thus  the  second 
attempt  of  Black  Hawk  to  make  peace  failed. 

From  this  time  on  the  story  of  the  campaign 
is  a  tale  of  relentless  pursuit  and  slaughter  of  the 
fugitives.  Black  Hawk  and  his  starving  war- 
party  reached  the  banks  of  the  Mississippi,  but 
an  American  steamer  prevented  their  crossing  in 
safety.  The  troops  came  upon  them  at  a  point 
called  Bad  Axe,  and  for  three  hours  the  bloody 
conflict  raged.  The  white  men  lost  only  seven- 
teen men  killed,  and  twelve  wounded.  At  least 
one  hundred  and  fifty  Indians  were  killed  in  the 
battle  and  as  many  more  men,  women,  and  chil- 
dren were  drowned  or  shot  down  in  their  attempts 


212         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

to  escape.  Nearly  a  thousand  Indians  had  crossed 
the  Mississippi  at  Rock  River,  two  hundred  miles 
below.  Barely  one  hundred  and  fifty  regained 
the  western  bank  at  Bad  Axe. 

General  Winfield  Scott  brought  home  the 
remaining  troops,  who  were  attacked  by  cholera 
on  the  journey  and  suffered  great  losses.  The 
Winnebagoes,  with  whom  Black  Hawk  sought 
refuge,  delivered  him  over  to  the  Americans,  who 
put  him  under  the  guardianship  of  his  former 
rival,  the  peace-loving  Keokuk.  By  order  of 
the  war  department  the  fallen  warrior  was  taken 
during  the  time  of  his  captivity  on  a  tour  of  the 
country  to  see  in  the  east  the  strength  of  the 
white  man  and  realize  the  futility  of  further  resist- 
ance by  the  Indian.  On  his  first  trip  he  went  to 
Washington,  was  received  by  President  Jackson, 
and  was  taken  to  Philadelphia,  New  York,  up  the 
Hudson,  and  back  by  way  of  the  Great  Lakes  to 
Rock  River,  where  he  was  set  free.  In  1837 
Keokuk,  who  did  not  dare  leave  him  unwatched 
in  his  absence,  took  him  to  Washington  again 
with  a  deputation  of  Sauk  and  Fox  Indians,  and 
on  this  trip  he  went  to  Boston.  The  experiences 
of  the  savage  warrior  in  this  eastern  city  take  us 
back  to  the  time  when  Champlain  took  his  Indian 


The  Black  Hawk  War  213 

host  Darontal  to  the  little  settlement  at  Quebec 
in  1616,  and  showed  him  the  civilization  of  the 
Frenchman.  Nothing  could  portray  better  the 
change  in  the  relations  of  the  white  man  and  the 
red  man  in  the  two  hundred  years  that  had  come 
between. 

The  Indian  delegation  was  received  by  the 
mayor,  the  aldermen,  and  the  common  council  of 
Boston  at  Faneuil  Hall.  The  armories  and  the 
navy-yard  were  visited  to  show  the  military  power 
of  Bostonians ;  a  levee  was  held  at  Faneuil  Hall 
to  receive  the  ladies  who  desired  to  meet  the 
warriors;  and  on  Monday  morning,  October  30, 
1837,  they  were  formally  received  in  the  Hall  of 
the  House  of  Representatives  by  Governor 
Everett,  attended  by  his  staff  and  other  officers. 
In  flowing  and  graceful  language  the  governor 
welcomed  the  Indians  on  behalf  of  the  Common- 
wealth, addressing  them  in  the  Indian  style  of 
oratory.  The  chiefs  responded,  one  by  one,  to 
his  words,  Black  Hawk  in  a  shrill,  clear  voice 
that  attracted  the  attention  of  the  audience  to  the 
famous  veteran  warrior.  All  thanked  the  gov- 
ernor for  his  kind  words  and  shook  hands  with 
him,  expressing  their  desire  for  friendship  with 
the  white  men.  The  party  then  adjourned  to  the 


214         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

Boston  Common,  where  they  performed  a  series 
of  war-dances  in  the  presence  of  an  immense 
crowd;  and  in  the  evening  they  went  to  the 
Tremont  Theatre  to  see  "  The  Banker  of 
Bogota,"  which  was  being  played  there.  With 
this  scene  the  picture  of  the  life  of  the  last  great 
Indian  warrior  of  the  lake  region  ends.  Black 
Hawk  returned  to  his  home  and  died  the  next 
year  at  the  age  of  seventy-one,  in  a  reservation  at 
Des  Moines,  Iowa,  set  apart  for  him  and  his  few 
remaining  followers.  The  Indians  had  been 
humbled  and  defeated. 

The  Black  Hawk  War  called  national  attention 
to  the  western  country.  The  troops  had  explored 
a  wilderness  little  known  to  the  Americans,  and 
the  story  of  their  march  into  Wisconsin  had  been 
published  in  full  in  the  newspapers  of  the  East. 
Guide-books  were  issued,  painting  in  brilliant 
colors  the  charms  of  the  region,  and  a  tide  of 
westward  immigration  followed  the  sale  of  public 
lands  by  the  government.  Northern  Illinois 
gained  a  large  population,  and  Wisconsin  was 
made  a  territory  within  four  years.  The  founda- 
tion of  the  lake  states  had  been  laid;  the  North- 
west had  been  Americanized. 


PART  III 
OCCUPATION   AND    DEVELOPMENT 


CHAPTER   XVII 

GATEWAYS  OF  THE  GREAT  LAKES 

THE  Great  Lakes  are  entered  from  the 
outer  world  by  a  series  of  natural  gate- 
ways extending  from  the  mouth  of  the 
St.  Lawrence  to  the  westernmost  end  of  Lake 
Superior.  With  a  shrewd  instinct  the  savages 
selected  these  spots  as  the  centres  for  their  forest 
trails  and  as  the  crossing  places  over  which  they 
could  carry  their  boats  from  river  to  lake  and  lake 
to  river.  At  these  points  the  French  and  Eng- 
lish erected  stockades  and  forts  around  which 
gathered  small  settlements.  Americans,  entering 
at  the  beginning  of  the  nineteenth  century  into 
possession  of  the  country,  built  there  the  towns 
and  cities  which  to-day  command  the  commerce 
of  the  Great  Lakes.'  With  the  founding  of  these 
cities  the  period  of  permanent  occupation  begins. 
The  French  approached  the  Great  Lakes  from 
Quebec  and  Montreal.  Because  of  Iroquois  hos- 
tility they  avoided  the  southern  route  by  Niagara 

217 


21 8          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

and  along  Lake  Erie,  and.  ascended  instead  the 
Ottawa  River,  crossed  Lake  Nipissing,  and 
passed  through  Georgian  Bay  into  Lake  Huron. 
At  Sault  Ste.  Marie  and  Mackinac  they  built 
their  missions  and  trading  posts.  Here  Mar- 
quette  and  Joliet  heard  tales  of  the  great  river  to 
the  south  and  the  rich  copper  country  to  the  west, 
and  from  these  centres  the  French  explorers  started 
on  their  expeditions  into  Wisconsin,  Illinois,  and 
Indiana.  Before  the  English  had  explored  more 
than  a  narrow  strip  of  seaboard  the  French  were 
travelling  up  the  Fox- Wisconsin  rivers  to  the 
Mississippi,  or  by  way  of  the  Chicago  and  Illinois 
rivers  to  the  southern  country.  Returning  parties 
often  proceeded  by  way  of  the  Kankakee  River 
to  the  St.  Joseph,  or  by  the  Wabash  and  the 
Maumee  to  Toledo  on  Lake  Erie. 

Frontenac  saw  the  importance  of  occupying  the 
strategic  points  on  the  lakes.  He  himself  went 
up  the  St.  Lawrence  River  and  planted  on  the 
site  of  Kingston  the  fort  that  bore  his  name. 
He  encouraged  La  Salle  to  build  a  trading  post 
at  Niagara,  and  did  all  in  his  power  to  gain  Lake 
Erie  and  Lake  Ontario  for  the  French.  Grad- 
ually the  French  succeeded  in  making  their  way 
eastward.  They  occupied  the  strait  of  Detroit, 


Gateways  of  the  Great  Lakes  219 

and  built  forts  at  Sandusky,  Presque  Isle  (Erie), 
Niagara,  Oswego,  and  Toronto.  The  English 
seized  these  forts  and  planted  many  more. 
When  the  Americans  in  their  turn  took  posses- 
sion, and  Wayne's  treaty  of  Greenville  gave,  in 
1796,  some  assurance  of  safety  in  the  region,  they 
sent  out  not  only  soldiers  but  colonists  and 
settlers.  Their  story  is  the  tale  of  the  beginning 
of  our  modern  civilization. 

In  the  early  days  of  the  American  Revolution, 
Congress  suggested  to  the  states  that  they  should 
cede  their  claims  to  lands  west  of  the  Allegheny 
to  the  central  government ;  but  many  years 
elapsed  before  the  United  States  gained  from 
the  eastern  states  these  cessions.  Of  all  the 
states  Connecticut  had  the  best  claim  ;  in  making 
its  cession  it  reserved  a  triangular  bit  of  country 
on  the  southern  shore  of  Lake  Erie,  west  of 
Pennsylvania,  which  was  known  as  the  Western 
Reserve.  Before  long  a  Connecticut  land  com- 
pany bought  three  million  acres  in  this  tract  at 
forty  cents  an  acre,  and  in  the  spring  of  1796 
Moses  Cleveland  with  fifty  associates  set  out  to 
plant  on  the  shores  of  Lake  Erie  the  colony  of 
New  Connecticut.  They  decided  to  found  their 
first  settlement  at  the  mouth  of  the  Cuyahoga 


220         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

River,  which  was  the  terminus  of  several  trails, 
notably  that  which  led  to  Akron,  Ohio,  and 
south  to  Marietta.  At  this  spot,  on  the  22d 
of  July,  1796,  they  began  to  build  their  houses, 
where  stands  to-day  the  city  of  Cleveland,  and 
so  rapid  was  the  growth  of  this  region  that  in 
four  years'  time  there  were  thirty-two  settlements 
within  the  limits  of  the  Connecticut  Reserve. 

Massachusetts  ceded  to  the  United  States  her 
claims  to  lands  west  of  Pennsylvania,  but  retained 
her  right  to  lands  in  what  is  now  western  New 
York.  In  1788  she  sold  to  a  company  of  New 
Yorkers  a  large  part  of  these  lands,  including 
the  Genesee  Valley.  At  this  time  there  was  but 
one  white  man's  cabin  between  Oswego  and  Fort 
Niagara.  The  falls  of  the  Genesee  attracted 
settlers,  because  there  they  could  build  mills  for 
grinding  corn  and  sawing  lumber.  Colonel 
Nathaniel  Rochester,  with  three  other  Maryland 
gentlemen,  purchased  in  1802  one  hundred  acres 
at  this  point,  including  the  site  of  this  mill,  and 
laid  out  a  village,  opening  the  sale  of  lots  in 
1811.  He  moved  to  his  land  in  1818,  the  little 
village  was  named  after  him,  and  before  many 
years  became  a  prosperous  town. 

Buffalo    was     founded    by    Joseph     Ellicott, 


Gateways  of  the  Great  Lakes  221 

brother  of  the  first  surveyor-general  of  the 
United  States.  He  laid  out  the  town  on  the 
plan  of  Washington  city,  with  broad,  radiating 
avenues,  and  gave  to  them  Dutch  names,  as  Vol- 
lenhoven  and  Schimmelpennick,  calling  the  vil- 
lage New  Amsterdam.  When  the  town  was 
incorporated  in  1810,  the  inhabitants  renamed 
it  Buffalo,  according  to  the  old  Indian  name  for 
the  creek  which  makes  into  the  lake  at  this  point. 
The  prosperity  of  Buffalo  and  Rochester,  and 
of  Oswego,  which  was  incorporated  as  a  village 
in  1828,  was  assured  by  the  building  of  the  Erie 
Canal  system  in  1825. 

In  spite  of  her  hundred  years  of  history  De- 
troit began  life  anew  under  American  rule.  In 
1805  the  town  caught  fire,  and  within  four  hours 
the  old  French  settlement  was  gone.  Of  two 
hundred  buildings  within  the  stockade,  only  one 
was  left  standing.  The  newly  elected  officers 
of  Ohio  Territory  reached  Detroit  the  day  after 
the  fire  to  find  the  town  wiped  out,  and  in  a 
few  years  the  American  Detroit  was  laid  out 
and  built  up  on  the  favorite  plan  of  the  city  of 
Washington. 

The  western  lakes  had  been  the  first  to  be  ap- 
proached by  Frenchmen  coming  from  the  north  ; 


222         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

they  were  the  last  to  be  settled  by  Americans 
coming  from  the  Atlantic  seaboard.  But  when 
their  importance  came  to  be  recognized  their 
cities  sprang  up  with  amazing  rapidity.  By  the 
treaty  of  Greenville  the  Indians  ceded  to  the 
white  men,  along  with  other  territory,  "  one  piece 
of  land  six  miles  square  at  the  mouth  of  the 
Checagau  River."  This  spot  had  always  been  a 
centre  for  Indian  tribes  and  for  fur  trade.  In 
1821  Governor  Cass  bought  from  the  Indians 
this  part  of  Illinois  and  the  state  of  Michigan. 
Trade  with  the  Indians  attracted  a  few  settlers 
to  Chicago  during  the  next  few  years,  and  in 
1 833  twenty-eight  electors  met  and  chose  trustees 
to  administer  public  affairs.  They  established 
a  free  ferry  across  the  river,  reconstructed  and 
strengthened  the  log  jail,  and  built  for  twelve 
dollars  an  estray  pen  for  lost  animals,  and  thus 
the  town  of  Chicago  began.  Four  years  later  it 
became  an  organized  municipality  with  a  popula- 
tion of  four  thousand.  It  was  the  centre  of  one 
of  the  land-booms  which  collapsed  in  the  panic 
of  1837,  and  suffered  for  many  years  thereafter 
a  succession  of  disasters.  Floods  swept  the  low 
ground  on  which  the  town  was  built,  which  has 
since  been  elevated ;  cholera,  droughts,  and 


Gateways  of  the  Great  Lakes  223 

financial  panics  came  upon  her  but  were  unable 
to  conquer.  From  the  great  fire  of  1871  Chicago 
rose  once  more  to  justify  the  opportunities  of  her 
location  and  to  become  the  leading  city  of  the 
Great  Lakes. 


The  Black  Hawk  War  opened  up  in  1832  the 
southern  part  of  Wisconsin.  Land  along  the 
Milwaukee  River  was  purchased  by  the  Indians, 
and  in  1835  the  first  white  owners  began  their 
homes.  In  the  summer  of  1836  there  was  a  rush 
of  immigration.  Sixty  buildings  were  put  up  in 
the  seven  months,  and  more  would  have  been 
erected  if  lumber  could  have  been  obtained. 
Streets  were  graded,  ferries  established,  and  on 
July  14  the  first  number  of  the  first  newspaper 
of  Milwaukee  issued  a  call  to  "all  good  men  and 
true"  to  assemble  and  petition  the  governor  to 


224         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

appoint  officers  of  law  for  the  township.  That 
winter  seven  hundred  people  stayed  in  the  town, 
and  three  years  later  the  canal  from  Rock  River 
to  Milwaukee  made  the  town  an  eastern  gateway 
for  the  trade  of  the  new  territory  of  Wisconsin, 
which  was  at  that  time  notably  wealthy  in  furs. 
In  1846  the  town  became  a  city. 

Through  the  entire  struggle  for  possession  of 
the  Great  Lakes,  Mackinac  and  Sault  Ste.  Marie 
had  kept  their  positions  as  trading  centres 
and  points  for  military  defence.  No  permanent 
settlement  was  made  west  of  these  posts  for  many 
years.  Nearly  two  centuries  before  the  city  of 
Duluth  was  founded,  Daniel  Greyselon  Du  Luth 
was  leader  of  an  expedition  organized  by  French 
merchants  of  Quebec  and  Montreal  to  trade  with 
the  Indians.  In  the  course  of  his  dealings  with 
the  tribes  he  held  an  important  conference  at  the 
head  of  the  lake,  where  a  trading  post  was  later 
established  on  land  now  a  part  of  the  city  of 
Superior,  Wisconsin,  opposite  the  city  of  Duluth. 
This  trading  station  was  owned  by  the  North- 
western Fur  Company,  and  was  an  important 
meeting-place  for  white  men  and  Indians.  In 
1826,  on  his  second  western  trip,  Governor  Lewis 
Cass  concluded  at  this  Minnesota  outpost  a  treaty 


Gateways  of  the  Great  Lakes  225 

with  the  Indians,  giving  to  the  United  States  the 
right  to  explore  and  carry  away  any  minerals  that 
might  be  found  in  the  country  bordering  on  the 
lake.  To  gain  this  important  concession  the 
commissioners  determined  to  do  all  they  could  to 
impress  the  tribes  with  the  power  and  majesty  of 
the  United  States*  representatives.  In  barges 
from  which  the  Stars  and  Stripes  were  gayly  fly- 
ing, and  to  the  tune  of  "  Hail  Columbia,"  played 
by  a  military  band,  the  treaty-makers  sailed  into 
the  harbor  amid  the  shouts  and  cheers  of  the 
Indians  on  the  shore.  The  treaty  was  signed, 
and  later  agreements  also  made  on  this  spot  gave 
to  the  government  the  remainder  of  the  country. 
By  1850  there  were  permanent  settlers  at  the 
head  of  the  lake  as  well  as  lumbermen  all  along 
the  St.  Croix  River.  Congress  appropriated  in 
1854  money  to  build  a  road  to  connect  Lake 
Superior  by  the  St.  Croix  Valley  with  the  Missis- 
sippi River.  The  settlers  at  Superior,  Wiscon- 
sin, were  bitter  rivals  of  those  at  Duluth.  In 
order  to  be  sure  to  get  the  road  they  cut  a  road 
southward  from  Superior  to  meet  it  and  bring 
it  out  on  the  Wisconsin  side  of  the  St.  Louis 
River.  In  this  way  Superior  got  the  start  of 
Duluth,  but  the  latter  was  incorporated  in  1857, 


226          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

and    became    before    many    years    a    prosperous 
city. 

By  the  middle  of  the  nineteenth  century 
Duluth,  the  most  remote  gateway  of  the  Great 
Lakes,  had  begun  its  history  as  a  town.  In  1825 
Henry  Clay,  speaking  on  the  bill  to  grant  lands 
for  the  building  of  the  Soo  Canal,  had  mentioned 
these  great  waterways  as  "beyond  the  furthest 
bounds  of  civilization, — if  not  in  the  moon." 
Six  years  later  Edward  Everett  enunciated  the 
principle  of  the  future,  declaring  that  "intercourse 
between  the  mighty  interior  West  and  the  sea- 
coast  is  the  great  principle  of  our  commercial 
prosperity."  The  cities  of  the  Great  Lakes  — 
Buffalo,  Cleveland,  Detroit,  Chicago,  Milwaukee, 
and  Duluth — recognized  their  opportunity  to 
become  the  connecting  links  in  this  inevitable 
chain  of  intercourse.  Their  sites  were  strategic, 
but  they  had  much  to  do  to  meet  the  demands  of 
the  rapidly  increasing  commerce.  Their  citizens 
were  alert  and  eager  to  fulfil  these  demands. 
Buffalo  gained  her  position  as  the  terminus  of  the 
Erie  Canal  because  public-spirited  citizens  gave 
bonds  that  her  harbor  should  be  improved. 
Every  city  spent  large  sums  in  constructing  and 
improving  her  natural  facilities.  The  fresh  needs 


Gateways  of  the  Great  Lakes  227 

of  every  new  decade  have  been  met,  and  to-day 
the  lake  system  is  on  the  eve  of  even  greater 
achievements. 

These  cities  have  a  background  of  which  they 
may  well  be  proud, —  a  background  of  men 
who,  in  pioneer  times  of  hardship  and  poverty, 
were  men  of  prescience,  of  courage,  and  of  action. 
To-day  the  six  cities  have  a  population  of  nearly 
four  million  people.  United  by  their  common 
bond  of  harborage  on  the  Great  Lakes,  but  situ- 
ated in  six  states  of  the  Union,  these  cities  and 
their  smaller  <  neighbors  are  taking  a  prominent 
part  in  the  nation.  Men  of  vision  and  of  energy 
still  walk  their  streets,  planning  and  guiding  their 

1  present  and  future.  Their  sites  are  being  beauti- 
fied and  improved;  their  social  and  economic 
problems  are  being  solved ;  and  they  are  keeping 

^themselves  fit  gateways  for  the  prosperous  states 
they  represent  on  the  great  inland  seas  of  North 
America. 


CHAPTER   XVIII 

THE    STORY    OF    A    ROAD 

AS  the  Indian  read  in  the  signs  of  the  trail 
—  the  depth  of  a  moccasin  print  or  the 
direction  of  a  broken  twig  —  the  story 
of  those  who  had  journeyed  over  the  path  before 
him,  so  we  can  find  in  the  tale  of  successive  kinds 
of  roads  the  record  of  the  advance  of  the  white 
man  into  the  West.  For  roads  the  French  traders 
used  those  of  the  original  occupants  of  the  land,  — 
the  buffalo  tracks  and  the  Indian  trails.  English- 
speaking  settlers,  coming  from  the  Atlantic  sea- 
coast,  used  two  main  routes.  They  came  either 
by  river  and  portage  up  the  Ohio  and  its 
various  tributaries  to  Presque  Isle  on  Lake  Erie, 
or  from  Albany  across  western  New  York  to 
Niagara.  The  story  of  early  voyages  and  of  the 
founding  and  life  of  Detroit  gives  a  picture  of 
French  exploration  and  settlement ;  in  like  man- 
ner there  is  written  in  the  rapid  change  of  the 
land  and  water  thoroughfares  across  New  York 

228 


The  Story  of  a  Road  229 

State,  from  Indian  trail  and  river  course  to  turn- 
pike, canal,  and  railroad,  the  tale  of  the  settlement 
of  the  lake  region,  and  of  the  change  from  a  wil- 
derness to  a  thickly  populated  country. 

As  soon  as  the  explorer  landed  on  the  southern 
shores  of  La*ke  Erie,  Lake  Michigan,  and  Lake 
Superior,  he  came  upon  buffalo  roads  or  "traces." 
Sometimes  these  were  narrow  ditches,  a  foot  wide 
and  from  six  inches  to  two  feet  deep,  trodden 
down  by  the  impact  of  thousands  of  hoofs  as  herd 
after  herd  of  buffaloes  had  stamped  along  in  single 
file  behind  their  leaders.  When  the  first  path 
became  too  deep  for  comfort  because  of  repeated 
travel,  the  buffaloes  would  abandon  it  and  begin 
a  second  path  alongside  the  first,  and  thus  the 
frequented  traces  would  be  gradually  widened. 
Again  an  immense  herd  of  these  heavy  animals 
would  crash  through  the  forest,  breaking  in  their 
rapid  progress  a  broad,  deep  road  from  one  feed- 
ing-ground to  another.  As  this  route  would  be 
followed  again  and  again  by  this  and  other  herds, 
it  would  become  level  and  hard  as  rock,  so  that 
there  was  great  rejoicing  in  pioneer  settlements 
when  the  weary  road-makers,  struggling  with  log 
causeways  and  swampy  hollows,  came  upon  a 
firm,  solid  buffalo  trace.  Nor  was  this  an  un- 


230         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

common  experience.  The  line  of  many  of  these 
roads  is  followed  to-day  by  our  railroads  and 
canals  as  it  was  followed  in  the  middle  period  by 
log  roads  and  turnpikes.  The  buffalo  was  a  good 
surveyor.  He  did  not  reason  out  why  he  should 
go  in  a  certain  direction,  but  his  sure  instinct  took 
him  by  the  easiest  and  most  direct  paths  over 
high  lands  and  low  to  the  salt  licks  and  water- 
courses which  were  his  goal.  Indeed,  he  observed 
precisely  the  principles  which  govern  to-day  the 
civil  engineer.  He  followed  the  level  of  the  val- 
ley ;  he  swerved  around  high  points  wherever  it 
was  possible,  crossing  the  ridges  and  watersheds 
at  the  best  natural  divides  and  gorges;  and  he 
crossed  from  one  side  of  a  stream  of  water  to  the 
other  repeatedly  in  order  to  avoid  climbing  up 
from  the  level,  after  the  fashion  of  our  modern 
loop  railways. 

Not  so  conspicuous,  but  more  numerous,  were 
the  Indian  trails.  Where  their  destination  was 
the  same  the  Indians  used  the  buffalo  roads,  but 
their  own  paths  were  quite  distinct.  These  were 
narrow  foot-paths,  usually  from  twelve  to  eighteen 
inches  wide,  through  which  the  Indians  travelled 
single  file.  Three  things  were  necessary  for  an 
Indian  trail :  it  must  be  secluded,  hidden  if  pos- 


The  Story  of  a  Road  231 

sible  from  hostile  eyes ;  it  must  be  direct ;  and  it 
must  be  dry.  Over  these  narrow  lanes  the  trees 
and  bushes  interlaced  so  closely  that  it  was  impos- 
sible to  see  more  than  a  rod  or  two  ahead,  and  a 
neglected  path  soon  became  impassable.  To 
know  which  paths  could  be  traversed  at  each  season 
of  the  year,  and  where  storm,  flood,  or  fire  were 
likely  to  have  had  the  least  effect,  and  to  be  able 
to  follow  the  forkings  and  windings  of  these  forest 
routes,  was  to  be  skilled  in  the  art  of  the  woods- 
man and  to  be  valuable  as  a  guide. 

Like  the  buffalo  traces  the  Indian  paths  were 
often  worn  deep,  almost  always  six  inches  and 
sometimes  a  foot.  So  well-travelled  was  the 
Indian  trail  of  our  story,  the  Iroquois  trail  across 
New  York,  that  it  was  called  by  the  Jesuit  fathers 
"  The  Beaten  Road."  That  buffalo  came  as  far 
east  as  the  present  city  of  Buffalo,  New  York,  is 
beyond  question.  Whether  they  penetrated 
farther  into  the  interior  of  the  state  is  not  known, 
but  in  every  other  respect  this  region  had  each 
kind  of  road  in  turn.  It  is  not  only  one  of  the 
main  thoroughfares  of  travel,  but  is  also  a  typical 
scene  of  pioneer  adventure  and  achievement. 

The  main  Iroquois  trail  led  from  Albany,  the 
eastern  door  of  the  "  Long  House,"  to  Niagara,  the 


232          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

western  door.  It  followed  the  natural  geographi- 
cal route  along  the  Mohawk  Valley  to  Schenec- 
tady,  Utica,  and  Rome,  where  stood  the  great 
Mohawk  "  castles,"  and  turned  from  this  point 
south  to  Onondaga  (Syracuse),  the  centre  of  the 
confederacy,  and  westward  by  the  heads  of  Lake 
Seneca  and  Canandaigua  to  Lewiston  and  Niagara. 


It  is  unusual  among  Indian  trails  because  it  was 
notably  a  peace-path.  The  Six  Nations  rarely 
quarrelled  among  themselves,  but  kept  up  an 
interchange  of  goods  and  gossip  that  was  remark- 
able among  savages.  Runners  were  trained  to 
carry  summonses  to  councils  and  to  spread  the 
news.  It  was  said  that  it  took  only  three  days 
and  three  runners  to  send  a  message  from  one 
door  of  the  "  Long  House  "  to  the  other,  from 
Albany  to  Niagara,  a  distance  of  three  hundred 
miles,  each  Indian  being  expected  to  make  in  a 
day  his  "  century  run." 


The  Story  of  a  Road  233 

Along  the  line  of  this  trail  the  American 
pioneer  built,  in  the  twenty  years  from  1785  to 
1815,  his  log  roads  and  turnpikes.  They  were 
crude, rough  affairs,  "very  grievous  to  the  limbs," 
and  called  forth  the  maledictions  of  the  travellers 
who  ventured  off  the  usual  routes  into  the  out- 
skirts of  civilization.  As  the  district  grew  more 
populous  the  roads  came  gradually  under  state 
control.  Commissioners  and  improvement  com- 
panies connected  and  made  better  the  separate 
stretches  of  highway.  In  1794  the  legislature 
passed  a  law,  directing  the  state  road  to  be  ex- 
tended from  Fort  Schuyler  (Utica)  to  the  Gen- 
esee  River,  and  four  years  later  it  was  voted  to 
extend  it  "westward  to  the  extremity  of  the 
state."  This  western  end  of  the  road,  from  the 
Mohawk  River  to  Lake  Erie,  was,  as  it  happened, 
incorporated  by  the  state  under  the  name  of  "The 
Genesee  Turnpike"  in  1800  before  that  from 
Albany  to  the  Mohawk  was  given  formal  recog- 
nition. We  have  thus  the  unusual  spectacle  of  a 
road  established  in  the  remote  sections  of  the 
country  before  the  connecting  road  to  the  nearest 
city  is  completed.  To  raise  money  for  its  con- 
struction all  kinds  of  methods  had  been  used, 
from  government  appropriations  to  lotteries. 


234         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

The  method  of  road-building  in  the  pioneer 
settlements  was  one  that  developed  throughout 
the  colonies,  as  here  in  New  York,  into  the 
establishment  of  turnpike  roads.  At  first  the 
local  governments,  the  townships,  or  counties, 
built  the  roads.  As  these  became  inadequate, 
corporations  of  individuals  were  given  permission 
to  build  roads  and  charge  tolls  for  their  use. 
The  name  of  turnpike  was  given  to  these  private 
highways  because  at  the  place  where  toll  was  to 
be  collected  there  was  placed  a  gate  hung  in  such 
a  way  as  to  turn  on  a  post.  This  gate  was  made 
of  a  long  pole  and  could  be  swung  across  the 
road  to  stop  carriages,  animals,  and  people  till 
the  toll  fees  had  been  collected.  When  a  cor- 
poration was  given  a  charter,  the  legislature  pre- 
scribed the  number  of  toll-gates  to  be  set  up  on 
the  given  length  of  road,  and  gave  the  usual  form 
for  tolls.  The  directors  were  left  to  fill  in  the 
fees  in  each  case.  This  accepted  table  of  tolls 
shows  the  kind  of  vehicles  in  use  in  New  York 
at  this  time.  A  one-horse  two-wheeled  carriage 
was  called  a  sulky,  chair,  or  chaise.  A  chariot, 
coach,  coachee,  or  phaeton  might  be  drawn  by 
one  horse,  but  was  more  commonly  specified  to 
have  two.  Stage-wagons,  stages,  and  other  four- 


The  Story  of  a  Road  235 

wheeled  carriages  drawn  by  two  horses  had  their 
separate  fee.  Just  as  our  highway  commissioners 
of  to-day  encourage  wide  tires  because  they  put 
less  wear  on  the  road,  so  in  these  days  there  was  a 
rule  that  carriages  with  tires  twelve  inches  wide 
should  pay  no  tolls,  nine-inch  tires  should  ex- 
empt .the  vehicle  from  three-quarters  of  the  tolls, 
and  six-inch  from  one-half.  It  was  required  that 
the  table  of  tolls  be  posted  in  a  conspicuous 
place  over  the  gate. 

In  March,  1813,  Nathaniel  Rochester  and 
other  gentlemen  were  given  permission  to  form 
a  turnpike  company  for  a  road  from  Canandaigua 
to  the  falls  of  the  Genesee  River.  As  this  was 
not  a  thickly  settled  region  the  table  of  tolls  is  a 
simple  one  without  elaborate  specifications  as  to 
the  kinds  of  carriages  and  with  only  two  toll- 
gates,  but  as  part  of  our  historic  road  it  is  of 
special  interest. 

Table   of  Tolls  of  Rochester  Turnpike   Company, 

March  31,  1813 

CENTS 
For  every  cart,  wagon,  or  other  wheeled  carriage,  drawn 

by  2  horses,  mules,  or  oxen 12^ 

And  for  each  additional  horse,  mule,  or  ox     ....  6 

For  every  cart,  wagon,  or  other  two-wheeled  carriage 

drawn  by  I  horse  or  mule  • 9 


236          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

CENTS 

For  every  horse  rode,  led,  or  driven 6 

For   every   four-wheeled    pleasure    carriage   or  wagon 

drawn  by  2  horses 25 

And  for  each  additional  horse 6 

For  every  sleigh  or  sled  drawn  by  I  horse,  mule,  or  ox  6 

And  for  every  additional  horse,  mule,  or  ox   ....  6 

For  every  score  of  horses,  mules,  or  cattle     ....  20 
And  in  like  proportion  for  a  greater  or  less  number 

For  every  score  of  sheep  or  hogs 8 

And  in  like  proportion  for  a  greater  or  less  number 

In  the  next  chapter  the  experiences  of  two 
travellers  are  given,  the  first  in  1796,  the  second 
in  1811.  The  two  accounts  of  their  journeys 
show  the  wonderful  transformation  wrought  along 
the  line  of  this  highway  in  fifteen  years.  By  the 
end  of  the  first  decade  of  the  nineteenth  century 
New  York  State  had  one  hundred  and  thirty-one 
turnpikes,  and  our  second  traveller  was  constantly 
hearing  discussion  of  a  new  project  to  which  the 
enterprising  leaders  of  the  state  were  turning 
their  attention.  For  purposes  of  trade  the  new 
land  route  had  never  supplanted  the  old  water- 
ways. With  the  rapid  occupation  of  the  region 
of  the  Great  Lakes  this  trade  was  increasing  at  a 
surprising  rate,  and  much  of  it  was  being  di- 
verted to  the  English  merchants  of  the  St.  Law- 


The  Story  of  a  Road  237 

rence  River,  because  of  .the  greater  facility  of  the 
route  to  Montreal  over  that  to  New  York.  It 
cost  only  a  dollar  and  a  half  to  send  a  barrel  of 
flour  from  Cayuga  in  western  New  York  to 
Montreal,  while  it  took  at  least  two  dollars  and  a 
half  to  get  the  same  barrel  from  Cayuga  only  as 
far  as  Albany.  If  this  were  true  of  western  New 
York,  it  was  even  more  true  of  the  southern 
shores  of  the  Great  Lakes. 

Only  an  artificial  canal  could  overcome  the 
natural  obstacles  to  water  transportation,  and  this  .  Cyl^ 
the  leading  men  of  New  York  were  urging  with 
all  their  power.  Since  1792  the  Western  Inland 
Lock  Navigation  Company  had  been  seeking 
systematically  to  improve  the  existing  water  route 
by  building  canals  around  the  worst  obstructions 
to  navigation,  the  various  falls  and  rapids  of  the 
Mohawk  River.  From  the  success  of  these  small 
ventures  and  the  no  less  convincing  evidence  of 
the  ability  of  the  canal  to  solve  the  whole  prob- 
lem, came  in  the  minds  of  Gouverneur  Morris, 
Jesse  Hawley,  and  others  the  plan  to  connect  the 
Atlantic  with  the  lakes  by  an  artificial  waterway. 
To  Governor  De  Witt  Clinton  and  his  associates 
belongs  the  credit  of  working  out  this  stupendous 
undertaking.  The  story  of  its  progress  and 


238          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

achievement  is  too  long  a  tale  to  be  summarized 
here,  but  must  be  reserved  for  another  chapter. 
In  1825  the  Erie  Canal  of  three  hundred  and 
sixty-three  miles  was  completed  and  opened  with 
appropriate  ceremonies. 

The  turnpike  had  followed  the  line  of  the  old 
Iroquois  trail.  The  canal  had  followed  it  in  cer- 
tain sections  but  had  swerved  off  and  gone  north- 
ward along  a  minor  Indian  trail  which  passed 
over  a  natural  highway  formed  by  a  wide  ridge 
from  four  to  six  miles  inland  from  the  shores  of 
Lake  Ontario.  This  was  what  was  called  by  the 
pioneers  the  Ridge  Road  from  Lewiston  to 
Rochester.  One  more  kind  of  road  was  destined 
to  cross  the  state,  supplanting  the  lumbering 
stage-wagon  and  the  slow  canal-boat  for  the  pur- 
poses of  travel,  and  even  as  time  went  on  for  the 
carrying  of  freight.  The  first  piece  of  railroad 
to  be  built  in  New  York  State,  and  one  of  the 
oldest  in  the  United  States,  was  the  Mohawk  and 
Hudson.  It  was  chartered  in,  1826,  the  year 
after  the  completion  of  the  Erie  Canal,  and  work 
was  begun  upon  it  in  1830.  Seventeen  miles  of 
this  road,  connecting  Albany  and  Schenectady, 
were  opened  in  1831  ;  the  remaining  part  from 
Schenectady  to  Utica  five  years  later.  Horses 


The  Story  of  a  Road  239 

were  used  when  the  road  was  put  into  operation, 
so  that  it  was  in  reality  little  more  than  a  tram- 
way, but  locomotives  were  soon  substituted. 
The  third  engine  built  in  the  United  States  was 
sent  from  the  West  Point  Foundry  Works  to 
this  little  piece  of  road.  It  was  called  the  De 
Witt  Clinton,  and  was  built  in  1831.  It  weighed 
three  and  a  half  tons  where  now  two  hundred  tons 
is  not  considered  especially  heavy  for  an  engine, 
and  was  fed  by  anthracite  coal.  Mr.  William  H. 
Brown,  who  was  one  of  the  passengers  on  the 
first  trip,  was  so  impressed  by  the  appearance 
of  this  "  singular-looking  affair  and  its  equally 
singular-looking  appendages,"  that  he  sketched 
on  the  back  of  a  letter  a  drawing  of  the  engine 
and  the  passenger-cars,  with  correct  likenesses, 
which  he  afterwards  enlarged  to  a  picture  six  feet 
long  which  was  cut  out  of  black  paper  in  silhou- 
ette fashion  and  is  in  possession  of  the  Connecti- 
cut Historical  Society.  Reproductions  of  this 
picture  give  a  good  idea  of  the  first  locomotive 
and  train  of  passenger-cars  ever  run  in  the  state 
of  New  York.  The  cars  are  those  which  had 
been  used  for  a  year  with  horses  on  this  same 
route. 

A  great  crowd  assembled  on  August  9,  1831, 


240         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

to  see  the  train  start.  The  fortunate  guests  of 
the  road  climbed  into  their  seats,  the  engineer 
took  his  place  on  the  tender,  a  tin  horn  was 
sounded,  and  the  train  with  its  five  passenger- 
coaches  started  off.  The  outside  passengers  had 
no  awning  or  roof  to  protect  them,  and  as  the 
sparks  and  smoke  were  blown  back  they  began 
to  fear  for  their  combustible  straw  hats  and 
summer  garments ;  but  no  accident  happened. 
The  passengers  had  hardly  had  time  to  adjust 
their  high  beavers  and  settle  themselves  after  the 
shock  of  starting,  which-  had  been  with  such  a 
jerk  that  they  had  been  knocked  into  each  other 
and  against  the  low  roof,  when  the  train  stopped 
abruptly  at  the  first  water  station  on  the  road. 
Here  a  halt  was  made  and  an  experiment  tried 
to  avoid  these  unpleasant  jerks.  The  links  in 
the  couplings  of  the  cars  were  stretched  to  their 
utmost  length,  and  rails,  borrowed  unceremoni- 
ously from  a  neighboring  fence,  were  bound  to 
these  couplings,  one  between  each  pair  of  cars, 
to  hold  the  coaches  steady.  This  arrangement 
worked  well,  and  in  a  short  time  the  train  pulled 
into  Schenectady,  where  thousands  of  people  were 
lined  up  to  await  its  coming. 

As  in  the  case  of  the  canal  and  the  turnpike, 


The  Story  of  a  Road  241 

small  sections  of  the  railroad  were  built  first,  and 
finally  joined  into  one  long  highway.  Eight 
short  lines  were  built  in  New  York  along  the 
line  of  the  road  to  Lake  Erie  and  were  put  in 
operation  at  different  times.  These  lines  were 
owned  in  1842  by  eleven  companies.  The  ten- 
dency to  consolidation  reduced  the  number  to 
seven  by  1850,  and  then  the  great  era  of  concen- 
tration brought  them  all  under  the  New  York 
Central  management. 

From  the  leaf-strewn  path  for  the  moccasined 
Indian  the  road  of  our  story  has  become  a  part 
of  a  system  of  seventy  thousand  miles  of  high- 
way which  replace  the  turnpikes  in  connecting 
the  towns  of  New  York  State.  Its  turbulent 
streams  have  become  the  feeders  for  a  great 
artificial  waterway,  and  an  iron-railed  road-bed 
stretches  along  its  route,  over  which  flies  a  lim- 
ited train  at  the  rate  of  seventy  miles  an  hour. 
The  lumbering  stage-wagon  has  given  way  to  the 
smooth-running  drawing-room  car.  The  rivers 
and  swamps  are  spanned  by  fine  bridges.  The 
story  of  the  road  has  been  one  of  swift  change 
and  rapid  advance. 


CHAPTER   XIX 

BEFORE    AND    AFTER    THE    TURNPIKE 

BEFORE  the  nineteenth  century,  travellers 
who  visited  Niagara  generally  went  there 
by  way  of  Montreal  and  Lake  Ontario, 
returning  to  the  seacoast  by  Presque  Isle  (Erie, 
Pennsylvania)  and  Pittsburg  to  Philadelphia  or 
Baltimore.  Occasionally  an  adventurous  tourist 
struck  out  from  Albany  into  the  "  Back  Woods/' 
Such  an  one  was  Lieutenant  John  Harriott,  an 
Englishman,  who  visited  whatever  parts  of  the 
known  world  he  could  reach  and  recorded  his 
journeyings  in  a  book  with  the  suggestive  title,  — 
"  Struggles  Through  Life,  Exemplified  in  the 
Various  Travels  and  Adventures  in  Europe, 
Asia,  Africa,  and  America/'  In  June,  1796,  he 
set  out  from  New  York  on  a  "  tour  to  view  the 
back  lands/'  He  chose  the  land  route  to  Albany, 
going  the  one  hundred  and  sixty  miles  in  a 
"  coachee "  drawn  by  two  horses.  Albany  he 
describes  as  a  town  of  "  upwards  of  six  thousand 

242 


Before  and  after  the  Turnpike         243 

inhabitants,  collected  from  various  parts.  .  .  . 
It  is  the  storehouse  for  the  trade  to  and  from 
Canada  and  the  lakes,  therefore  likely  to  flourish 
and  the  inhabitants  to  grow  rich."  The  next 
morning  he  set  off  at  half-past  five  and  travelled 
forty  miles  by  stage  through  the  fertile  country 
of  the  German  Flats,  every  now  and  then  being 
obliged  to  alight  and  walk  for  a  mile  or  two  as 
the  wagon  floundered  through  a  bit  of  swampy 
road,  or  up  a  steep  grade. 

Across  wet  places  were  bits  of  log  causeways. 
These  were  made  of  trunks  of  pine  and  oak  trees 
laid  down  crossways  layer  upon  layer,  regardless 
of  uniformity  of  size  or  the  comfort  of  those  who 
might  travel  over  them.  This  kind  of  road  was 
called  corduroy  because  it  resembled  the  French 
cloth  of  that  name.  In  drier  places,  the  settlers 
cut  down  trees  on  the  line  of  the  road.  Six  or 
eight  oxen  yoked  to  a  plough  would  stir  up  the 
soil  as  deeply  as  possible,  pulling  out  or  displacing 
stumps  or  rocks.  The  cleared  surface  would  then 
be  smoothed  over  a  little  and  left  to  be  worn 
hard  by  travel. 

The  "  coachee  "  or  stage-wagon,  in  which  Har- 
riott travelled  over  this  route,  was  typical  of  the 
region  and  was  not  supplanted  on  this  road 


244         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

twenty  years  later,  although  by  that  time  more 
modern  ones  had  been  put  on  the  line  between 
New  York  and  Boston,  and  New  York  and  Phila- 
delphia. The  body  of  the  coachee  was  rather 
long  in  proportion  to  its  breadth.  It  had  four 
seats,  each  holding  three  passengers,  who  faced 
towards  the  horses.  "  From  the  height  of  the 
seat,"  writes  a  traveller  of  the  time,  "  it  is  open 
all  round,  and  the  roof  is  supported  -by  slender 
shafts  rising  up  at  the  corners  and  sides ;  in  wet 
weather  a  leathern  apron  is  let  down  at  the  sides 
and  back,  to  protect  the  inmates."  The  wagon 
had  no  door ;  the  passengers  got  in  by  the  front, 
stepping  over  the  seats  as  they  went  backward. 
It  was  said  that  these  coaches  had  no  outside  seats 
on  top,  as  did  those  in  England,  because  the  ve- 
hicle lurched  and  jolted  so  violently  that  pas- 
sengers sitting  on  them  would  have  been  thrown 
off.  The  heavier  boxes  and  trunks  were  fastened 
behind,  upon  the  frame  of  the  carriage,  but  smaller 
articles  and  the  mail-bag  were  huddled  under  the 
seats,  to  the  great  annoyance  of  the  passengers,  who 
were  frequently  forced  "  to  sit  with  their  knees 
up  to  their  mouths  or  with  their  feet  insinuated 
between  two  trunks,  where  they  are  most  lovingly 
compressed  whenever  the  vehicle  makes  a  lurch 


Before  and  after  the  Turnpike         245 

into  a  rut."  The  body  of  the  wagon  was  sus- 
pended upon  two  stout  leathern  straps  passing 
lengthwise  under  it  and  strongly  secured  before 
and  behind.  When  these  straps  gave  way,  as 
they  sometimes  did,  the  driver  selected  a  stout 
rail  from  a  neighboring  fence.  The  passengers 
by  united  effort  thrust  in  this  substitute  for  a 
spring  and  the  conveyance  jolted  on. 

At  the  end  of  his  first  day's  journey,  Harriott 
found  that  the  coach  in  which  he  was  going  to 
proceed  had  been  overturned  and  broken  to 
pieces,  so  that  he  was  obliged  to  stop  three  days 
at  German  Flats  Town.  As  he  continued  on 
his  way  to  Fort  Schuyler  (Utica)  he  found  him- 
self in  a  rich  country  with  many  new  settlers,  but 
as  the  road  steadily  became  worse  and  worse, 
although,  as  he  says,  he  and  his  fellow-travellers 
"  alighted  safe  from  broken  bones,  [they  were] 
most  miserably  bruised  from  head  to  foot."  At 
Whitestown,  he  stayed  several  days  watching 
with  interest  the  allotment  of  land  to  settlers 
and  visiting  the  remnant  of  the  Six  Nations, 
some  sixteen  hundred  in  number,  all  that  were 
left  of  that  fierce  confederacy  that  so  long  had 
held  this  region  against  the  white  men. 

From  this  point  there  was  no  public  convey- 


246          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

ance,  and  Lieutenant  Harriott  bought  a  horse 
and  proceeded  in  company  with  a  young  farmer 
from  Massachusetts  who  was  making  his  third 
trip  westward  to  conclude  a  purchase  of  land  on 
the  Genesee  River  and  could  therefore  serve  as 
a  guide.  It  took  the  travellers  three  days  to 
reach  Geneva,  from  which  place  they  journeyed 
fifty  miles  to  the  river  and  thence  to  Niagara 
Falls,  seventy  miles  more  through  the  wilderness 
following  the  Indian  trails.  By  making  haste, 
they  avoided  spending  more  than  one  night  in 
the  woods.  As  darkness  fell,  they  made  a  bed 
of  boughs  and  kept  two  fires  burning  "  as  a  guard 
against  wolves  and  panthers."  Again  gaining 
the  Mohawk,  he  went  down-stream  in  a  bateau, 
managed  by  five  men,  which  he  hired  for  the  trip. 
On  his  return,  Harriott  wrote  that  "  except  for 
a  view  of  the  grand  falls,"  there  was  nothing 
to  reward  him  for  the  fatigue  of  the  journey. 
Fifteen  years  after  Harriott's  visit,  John 
Melish,  the  map-maker,  passed  over  the  same 
route.  He  had  come  from  Cleveland,  Ohio,  and 
Erie,  Pennsylvania,  to  the  Niagara  River  and  the 
town  of  Buffalo,  which  had  been  laid  out  about 
five  years  previously,  but  already  had  five  hun- 
dred inhabitants  and  was  rapidly  growing.  The 


Before  and  after  the  Turnpike          247 

buildings  were  mostly  of  wood,  painted  white, 
but  there  were  a  number  of  good  brick  houses 
and  a  few  of  stone.  There  were  four  taverns, 
eight  stores,  two  schools,  and  a  weekly  paper  in 
this  town,  which  Melish  prophesied  would  be- 
come a  great  settlement.  Already  roads  were 
being  constructed  in  all  directions,  and  the 
Albany  turnpike  had  been  brought  to  within  a 
few  miles  of  the  village.  As  he  travelled  along, 
he  was  surprised  to  find  the  country  so  well 
settled.  The  houses  were  so  frequent  that  the 
traveller  was  seldom  out  of  sight  of  one,  and 
every  few  miles  there  was  an  inn.  Lands  were 
all  taken  up  for  a  mile  or  so  on  either  side  of  the 
road.  He  constantly  met  parties  journeying 
westward  and  from  inquiry  found  that  a  family 
of  seven  could  travel  in  their  own  wagon  at  the 
rate  of  twenty  miles  a  day,  making  the  journey 
of  six  hundred  miles  from  Connecticut  to  Cleve- 
land at  an  expense  of  seventy  dollars.  The 
emigrants  would  carry  their  own  provisions  but 
would  stop  at  the  inns  to  feed  their  horses  and 
eat  their  food.  In  the  course  of  one  day's  jour- 
ney, he  met  more  than  twenty  families  thus  pro- 
ceeding westward. 

Stage  fares   would  have    made  the  trip   much 


248          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

more  expensive.  By  law  these  fares  could  not 
exceed  seven  cents  a  mile,  and  no  fees  to  drivers 
were  expected.  Stage  travel  was  at  this  time 
made  inconvenient  by  the  number  of  companies 
operating  only  on  short  sections  of  the  road. 
Each  proprietor  took  up  payment  for  his  own 
portion  of  the  way,  —  half  a  dollar  here,  seventy- 
five  cents  there,  —  and  turned  the  traveller  out 
of  his  vehicle  when  he  came  to  the  end  of  his 
stretch  to  wait  with  what  patience  he  could 
summon  till  the  next  stage  appeared. 

As  Melish  neared  Utica,  the  houses  along  the 
road  were  so  thick  that  it  was  for  a  considerable 
way  like  a  continuous  village.  Yet  here  as 
everywhere  on  the  route,  back  of  the  neat  white 
houses  with  their  green  blinds  and  roomy  verandas, 
and  the  fertile,  cultivated  plots  of  ground  around 
them,  the  land  would  be  covered  with  stumps 
from  one  to  three  feet  high,  and  the  smoke  of 
the  clearing  fires  could  often  be  seen  in  the  dis- 
tance. The  expense  of  the  trip  from  Buffalo  to 
Utica  had  been  ten  dollars  and  ninety-one  cents. 

Melish  had  made  his  journey  on  horseback, 
although  he  met  many  coaches  on  the  way. 
In  1819  an  Englishwoman  describes  a  trip  which 
she  made  from  Albany  to  Utica  in  one  of  the 


Before  and  after  the  Turnpike          249 

fifteen  coaches  that  made  the  trip  daily.  On  her 
way  she  met  the  man  who  eighteen  years  previ- 
ously had  carried  in  his  coat  pocket  the  weekly 
mail  between  the  two  towns.  She  found  the 
journey  rough,  but  her  companions  good-hu- 
mored, intelligent,  and  accommodating.  She  rec- 
ommended the  stage-coach  for  the  traveller  who 
wished  cc  to  see  people  as  well  as  things,  —  to 
hear  intelligent  remarks  upon  the  country  and  its 
inhabitants,  and  to  understand  the  rapid  changes 
that  each  year  brings  forth,  and  if  he  be  of  an  easy 
temper,  not  incommoded  with  trifles,  not  caring 
to  take,  nor  understanding  to  give,  offence,  liking 
the  interchange  of  little  civilities  with  strangers, 
and  pleased  to  make  an  acquaintance,  though  it 
should  be  but  one  of  an  hour,  with  a  kind-hearted 
fellow-creature,  and  if  too  he  can  bear  a  few  jolts, 
—  not  a  few,  —  and  can  suffer  to  be  driven  some- 
times too  quickly  over  a  rough  road,  and  some- 
times too  slowly  over  a  smooth  one,  —  then  let 
him,  by  all  means,  fill  a  corner  in  the  post-coach 
or  stage-wagon.  .  .  .  But  if  he  be  of  an  unsocia- 
ble humour,  easily  put  out  of  his  way,  or  as  the 
phrase  is,  a  very  particular  gentleman  —  then  he 
will  hire  or  purchase  his  own  dearborn  or  light 
wagon  and  travel  solus  cum  solo  with  his  own  horse." 


250         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

This  was  turnpike  travel  in  the  early  nineteenth 
century,  and  this  was  the  route  over  which  thou- 
sands of  families  made  their  way  to  the  lakes. 
For  years  the  tide  of  emigration  went  on  until 
the  story  of  western  New  York  was  repeated  in 
every  part  of  the  region,  and  the  wilderness  of 
twenty  and  thirty  years  before  became  the  seat  of 
thriving  towns  and  cities. 


CHAPTER   XX 

THE    ERIE    CANAL 

SINCE  the  beginning  of  the  century  there 
had  been  more  or  less  talk  of  a  canal  to 
connect  the  Hudson  with  Lake  Erie,  and 
in  1816  the  legislature  of  New  York  voted  to  un- 
dertake the  building  of  the  Erie  Canal.  The 
adoption  of  this  plan  and  its  success  were  due 
mainly  to  De  Witt  Clinton,  who  set  forth  in  a 
carefully  reasoned  memorial  the  advantages  of 
the  proposed  waterway.  For  years  thousands 
of  men  had  been  employed  in  the  work,  and 
many  difficulties  had  been  met  and  solved. 
Commissioners  had  been  appointed  to  determine 
the  route  which  the  canal  should  follow  and  to 
oversee  its  construction.  They  conducted  opera- 
tions in  three  sections,  intrusting  the  job  of  dig- 
ging and  filling  to  contractors,  no  contract  covering 
any  large  amount  of  territory. 

The  eastern  section  extended  along  the  line  of 
the  Iroquois  trail   up  the  Mohawk  Valley  from 

251 


252          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

Albany  to  Rome.  On  this  part  of  the  route 
swift  streams  had  to  be  crossed,  and  falls  and 
rapids  had  to  be  passed.  Where  the  canal  crossed 
creeks  and  streams,  guard  locks  were  built  to  keep 
the  water  from  rushing  into  the  canal  and  over- 
flowing it.  At  Little  Falls  there  was  such  a 
narrow  space  between  the  mountains  that  rocks 
had  to  be  blasted  to  make  a  bed  for  the  canal,  and 
a  wall  twenty  or  thirty  feet  high,  rising  from  the 
channel  of  the  Mohawk  River,  built  to  support 
it.  Other  falls  on  this  section  required  aque- 
ducts and  elaborate  series  of  locks. 

The  middle  section  followed  the  line  of  trail 
and  turnpike  as  far  as  Syracuse,  and  then  went 
northwards  to  Clyde  and  Montezuma.  It  had 
the  greater  part  of  the  "  Long  Level,"  a  sixty- 
nine-mile  stretch  from  a  point  east  of  Utica  to 
Syracuse,  without  any  locks.  At  Montezuma, 
near  the  beginning  of  the  third  section,  the 
builders  came  to  the  edge  of  the  Cayuga  marshes, 
and  here  they  erected  an  embankment,  nearly  two 
miles  long  and  so  high  that  boats  were  often  sev- 
enty-two feet  above  the  level  of  the  swamps.  At 
Rochester  a  great  aqueduct  was  built  at  the 
Genesee  River.  Between  Rochester  and  Buffalo 
the  canal  ran  for  a  long  distance  inside  the  great 


The  Erie  Canal  253 

ridge  which  rises  south  of  Lake  Ontario,  but  at 
Lockport  it  crossed  the  mountains.  Here  was 
performed  one  of  the  most  difficult  engineering 
feats  of  the  whole  construction.  An  excavation 
was  made  through  the  three-mile  ridge  at  an 
average  depth  of  twenty  feet,  and  five  great 
locks  were  built,  each  twelve  feet  high,  so  that 
vessels  were  elevated  and  dropped  sixty  feet. 

The  first  surveyors  drove  along  the  route  of 
the  canal  five  lines  of  stakes.  The  two  outer 
rows  were  sixty  feet  apart,  indicating  the  space 
to  be  cleared.  Between  these  were  two  other 
rows  forty  feet  apart,  which  indicated  the  exact 
width  of  the  canal,  and  in  the  middle  a  single 
line  of  stakes  marked  the  centre  of  the  waterway. 
It  was  eight  years  and  four  months  since  the 
surveyors  had  driven  these  stakes,  amid  the 
mocking  laughter  of  the  inhabitants,  who  thought 
these  dreamers  crazy  to  plant  their  bits  of  wood 
in  swamps  and  forests,  on  rocky  ledges  and  in 
watercourses.  In  spite  of  swamp  fever,  which 
had  at  one  time  laid  low  a  thousand  men,  and  in 
spite  of  rough  tools  and  almost  insuperable  ob- 
stacles, the  three  hundred  and  sixty-three  miles 
were  at  length  completed.  By  eighty-three  locks 
and  eighteen  aqueducts,  covering  a  descent  of 


254         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

568  feet  from  Lake  Erie  to  the  Hudson,  navi- 
gation was  made  open.  Sections  of  the  canal  had 
been  in  use  since  1819,  and  now,  on  October  26, 
1825,  Governor  Clinton  had  started  on  the  first 
trip  along  the  entire  length  of  the  waterway  which 
had  long  been  familiarly  known  as  "  Clinton's  Big 
Ditch." 

The  city  of  Buffalo  was  particularly  rejoiced 
over  this  occasion  because  the  western  terminus 
of  the  canal  had  long  been  in  doubt  and  had 
only  very  recently  been  settled  in  favor  of  that 
town  over  her  rival,  the  present  suburb  of  Black 
Rock.  Buffalo  was  located  on  the  shore  of 
Lake  Erie  at  the  mouth  of  the  Niagara  River. 
Black  Rock  was  three  miles  down  the  river,  and 
had  a  good  open  harbor,  in  which  its  citizens  had 
recently  built  a  two-mile  pier  to  protect  vessels 
from  the  waves  of  the  lake  and  river.  Buffalo 
Creek  had  a  troublesome  sand-bar  which  injured 
its  harbor,  and  the  Black  Rock  settlers  had  built 
their  pier  in  the  hope  of  stopping  the  canal  at 
their  town  instead  of  having  it  run  on  to  Buffalo. 
When  the  canal  commissioners  came  to  decide  on 
the  terminus,  they  were  of  the  opinion  that  the 
current  of  the  river  was  too  swift  at  Black  Rock, 
and  that  the  danger  from  ice  and  sunken  rocks 


The  Erie  Canal  255 

was  too  great.  They  would  bring  the  canal  to 
Buffalo  if  that  harbor  could  be  improved.  When 
the  public-spirited  men  of  that  place  heard  that, 
they  agreed  together  that  if  the  canal  was  brought 
to  their  town,  they  would  remove  the  sand-bar. 
They  clubbed  together  and  on  their  own  personal 
notes  borrowed  from  the  state  twelve  thousand 
dollars,  a  large  sum  in  those  days,  with  which 
they  removed  the  sand-bar  and  made  a  safe 
harbor. 

A  new  canal-boat,  the  Seneca  Chief y  had  been 
built  of  Lake  Erie  cedar  for  the  opening  trip, 
and  lay  moored  in  the  harbor  at  Buffalo.  On 
her  deck  were  two  paintings,  one  of  the  scene 
which  was  soon  to  be  enacted,  Buffalo  creek  and 
harbor  with  the  canal-boat  moving  away  along 
the  canal,  and  the  other  representing  Governor 
Clinton  as  Hercules,  dressed  in  Roman  costume, 
and  resting  from  his  labors.  At  nine  o'clock  in 
the  morning  a  grand  procession  formed  in  front 
of  the  court-house  and  marched  to  the  head  of 
the  canal.  Governor  Clinton  and  his  staff,  and 
a  group  of  prominent  New  Yorkers  who  had 
been  closely  connected  with  the  furtherance  of 
the  project,  went  on  board  the  Seneca  Chief  and 
an  address  was  given.  Upon  the  boat  had 


256         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

been  placed  two  new  kegs  containing  Lake  Erie 
water,  which  was  to  be  mingled  at  New  York  with 
that  of  the  ocean.  The  Seneca  Chief  was  to  be 
followed  by  four  other  canal -boats,  and  a  fifth 
craft,  which  was  called  Noah's  Ark.  The  last 
contained,  under  the  title  "  Products  of  the 
West,"  a  bear,  two  eagles,  two  fawns,  several  fish, 
and  two  Indian  boys,  —  the  counterparts  of  the 
"  beasts,  birds,  and  creeping  things  "  of  the  Bible 
story. 

As  four  magnificent  gray  horses  pulled  at  the 
tow-rope  of  the  Seneca  Chief,  and  the  vessel  be- 
gan to  move,  a  signal-gun  was  discharged,  and 
all  along  the  route  the  cannon  that  had  been 
stationed  took  up  the  sound  and  passed  it  on  till 
the  news  of  the  opening  was  carried  to  New 
York  in  one  hour  and  thirty  minutes.  New 
York  responded,  sending  the  message  back  to 
Buffalo  in  the  same  time. 

At  almost  every  town  and  village  along  the 
route  the  Seneca  Chief  was  met  with  exercises, 
dinners,  triumphal  arches,  and  illuminations.  So 
steadily  was  the  party  welcomed  and  feted  that  it 
took  them  six  days  to  make  the  journey  to 
Albany.  Two  or  three  of  the  celebrations  are  of 
especial  interest.  At  Lockport  the  boat  was 


The  Erie  Canal  257 

greeted  by  a  salute  of  guns  which  had  been  cap- 
tured by  Perry  at  the  battle  of  Lake  Erie,  being 
discharged  by  a  gunner  who  was  said  to  have 
fought  under  Napoleon.  At  Rochester  a  dra- 
matic ceremony  had  been  arranged.  Rain  was 
falling  when  the  guests  arrived,  but  this  did  not 
dampen  the  inhabitants'  zeal.  They  assembled 
in  large  numbers  along  the  banks  of  the  canal, 
headed  by  eight  companies  of  uniformed  soldiers. 
As  the  boat  approached  the  great  nine-arch  stone 
aqueduct  over  the  Genesee  River,  the  Young 
Lion  of  the  West,  stationed  there  "  to  protect 
the  entrance,"  pushed  out  from  the  shore  and  a 
voice  hailed  the  Seneca  Chief. 

"  Who  comes  there  ?  "  cried  the  Young  Lion  s 
spokesman. 

"  Your  brothers  from  the  West,  on  the  waters 
of  the  Great  Lakes." 

"  By  what  means  have  they  been  diverted  so 
far  from  their  natural  course  ?  " 

"  By  the  channel  of  the  Grand  Erie  Canal." 

"  By  whose  authority,  and  by  whom,  was  a 
work  of  such  magnitude  accomplished  ?  " 

"  By  the  authority  and  by  the  enterprise  of 
patriotic  people  of  the  state  of  New  York." 

At    this    answer    the    Young   Lion   gave    way, 


258          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

guns  were  fired,  and  amid  the  cheers  of  the  great 
crowd  the  flotilla  of  boats,  with  Governor  Clin- 
ton, Lieutenant-Governor  Talmadge,  and  other 
distinguished  men  on  deck,  floated  into  the  spa- 
cious basin  at  the  end  of  the  aqueduct.  The 
customary  procession  and  address  of  welcome 
were  followed  by  a  grand  ball  and  illumination, 
and  the  flotilla,  increased  by  the  Young  Lion  of 
the  West  with  several  Rochester  gentlemen  on 
board,  proceeded. 

At  Rome,  on  the  joth  of  October,  the  first 
sign  of  unfriendliness  was  encountered.  The  in- 
habitants of  that  place  were  dissatisfied  because 
the  canal  did  not  follow  the  line  of  the  old  water- 
way laid  out  by  the  Western  Inland  Locks  Navi- 
gation Company,  upon  which  the  village  of  Rome 
had  been  built.  On  the  day  when  the  group  of 
boats  left  Buffalo,  the  citizens  of  Rome  had  held 
a  solemn  mourning  assembly,  and  had  marched 
with  muffled  drums  from  the  old  canal  to  the 
new,  bearing  with  them  a  barrel  of  water  from  the 
old  which  they  emptied  into  the  new.  Even 
this  mournful  occasion  had  been  closed  with  an 
appropriate  celebration  and  feast  at  the  hotel,  but 
no  warm  welcome  greeted  the  travellers  on  the 
thirtieth.  At  Schenectady  rain  and  a  spirit  of 


The  Erie  Canal  259 

marked  opposition  met  them  because  it  was  be- 
lieved that  the  Erie  Canal  would  be  the  ruin  of 
the  town.  Hitherto  it  had  been  the  terminus  of 
the  Mohawk  River  route  and  of  the  western 
stage  and  wagon  lines.  The  opening  of  a  direct 
water  route  to  Albany  would  be  fatal  to  all  these 
interests.  Only  the  students  of  Union  College 
broke  through  the  general  disapproval,  and  did 
the  honors  of  the  town  in  the  pouring  rain. 
That  afternoon,  November  2,  the  boats  entered 
the  last  lock  at  Albany,  and  were  greeted  by  a 
welcoming  salute  of  twenty-four  cannon,  fol- 
lowed by  appropriate  ceremonies. 

From  Albany  the  canal-boats  were  towed  down 
the  Hudson  by  steamer  to  New  York,  where 
great  celebrations  had  been  prepared.  "  Never 
before,"  writes  an  enthusiastic  onlooker,  "was 
there  such  a  fleet  collected  and  so  superbly 
decorated ;  and  it  is  very  possible  that  a  display 
so  grand,  so  beautiful,  and  we  may  even  add, 
sublime,  will  never  again  be  witnessed." 

Governor  Clinton  poured  the  Lake  Erie  water 
into  the  ocean,  another  gentleman  poured  in 
water  from  several  other  places,  and  the  waters  of 
the  Atlantic  and  the  Great  Lakes  were  pro- 
nounced "  wedded,"  joined  in  indissoluble  union. 


260         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

A  procession  a  mile  and  a  half  long,  the  greatest 
ever  formed  in  America  at  that  date,  marched 
through  the  streets,  a  grand  exhibition  of  fire- 
works was  held,  and  a  ball  was  given  in  a  room 
made  by  the  joining  of  an  amphitheatre  and  a 
circus  building,  forming  the  largest  ball-room  ever 
used  in  America.  All  about  the  hall  the  great 
names  of  the  canal,  constructors  were  blazoned, 
and  in  the  ladies'  banquet  room  a  boat  made  of 
maple  sugar,  which  had  been  presented  to  Gov- 
ernor Clinton  at  Utica,  floated  in  a  vessel  filled 
with  Lake  Erie  water.  At  the  end  of  the  cele- 
bration the  committee  from  the  West  departed 
for  home,  bearing  a  keg  of  Atlantic  water,  orna- 
mented with  the  arms  of  the  city  of  New  York 
and  the  following  words  in  letters  of  gold  :  "  Nep- 
tune's return  to  Pan.  New  York,  4th  Nov.  1825. 
Water  of  the  Atlantic."  When  the  committee 
reached  Buffalo  with  this  gift,  they  held  the 
closing  scene  of  the  great  pageant,  mingling  the 
waters  of  the  Atlantic  with  those  of  Lake  Erie. 

If  words,  festivities,  symbolic  ceremonies,  and 
a  waterway  of  commerce  could  do  it,  the  Great 
Lakes  and  the  Atlantic  were  united.  The  im- 
portance of  the  outcome  justified  the  hopes  of 
the  canal-promoters.  The  canal  cost  nearly 


The  Erie  Canal  261 

eleven  million  dollars ;  but  the  last  debts  were 
discharged  in  1836.  Commerce  increased  greatly 
and  was  immensely  benefited,  and  within  twelve 
years  plans  were  on  foot  for  enlarging  the  canal, 
which  were  soon  carried  out. 

Travellers  soon  found  great  pleasure  in  making 
their  western  journeys  by  canal-boat,  and  the 
canal  became  a  thoroughfare  of  travel  as  well  as 
of  trade.  That  bright  and  interesting  raconteur, 
Mrs.  Anne  Royall,  went  west  by  this  route  in 
1827-1828,  and  left  a  vivid  account  of  the  boats 
and  their  method  of  locomotion.  The  canal  she 
describes  as  having  a  neat  railing  outside  the  tow- 
path,  painted  white  and  about  four  feet  high. 
Within  this  railing  the  route  was  fringed  on  both 
sides  with  beautiful  crimson  Canadian  thistles, 
which  flourished  in  the  sandy  gravel.  Two 
kinds  of  boats  passed  along  this  waterway, — 
packet  boats  and  freight  boats.  The  packet 
boats,  accommodating  about  thirty  passengers, 
were  fitted  up  with  dining-rooms,  separate  quar- 
ters for  ladies  and  gentlemen,  and  rooms  lined 
with  berths,  as  was  the  custom  in  all  steamboats 
of  that  day.  The  fare,  including  board,  was 
four  cents  a  mile ;  without  board,  three  cents. 
The  prices  were  thirty-seven  and  a  half  cents  for 


262          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

dinner,  twenty-five  for  breakfast,  and  twelve  and 
a  half  for  lodging.  Mrs.  Roy  all  made  her  first 
journey  from  Schenectady  to  Utica,  a  distance  of 
eighty  miles,  passing  through  twenty-six  locks, 
in  twenty-four  hours.  The  boat  was  drawn  by 
three  stout  horses,  who  proceeded  at  a  brisk  trot 
and  were  relieved  every  ten  miles  by  fresh  horses 
and  a  new  driver.  Freight  boats  were  drawn  by 
two  horses  or  even  only  one,  and  took  passengers 
at  the  same  rate  as  freight,  a  cent  and  a  half  a 
mile. 

Whenever  her  boat  met  another,  and  this  was 
very  often,  Mrs.  Royall  sat  in  dread  of  a  collision, 
or  at  least  a  tangling  of  the  ropes,  but  each  time 
they  slipped  past  each  other  as  if  by  magic.  After 
some  watching  she  saw  that  the  boats  going  west 
had  the  right  of  way  and  proceeded  as  usual,  while 
the  boatman  of  the  vessel  going  east  checked  his 
horses  till  the  rope  fell  for  an  instant  very  loose 
in  the  water,  and  the  other  boat  and  team  could 
slip  over  it.  The  canal  was  frequently  crossed  by 
bridges,  which  made  sitting  on  the  upper  deck 
dangerous  ;  but  when  they  approached  one  of 
these  obstructions  the  helmsman  called  out  in  a 
loud  voice,  "  Low  bridge ! "  and  the  passengers 
promptly  "  ducked  "  their  heads.  When  the  tow- 


The  Erie  Canal  263 

path  crossed  the  bridge  instead  of  going  under  it, 
the  driver  swung  his  team  over  so  fast  that  the 
movement  of  the  boat  was  barely  slackened. 
These  boats  carried  the  mails,  were  widely  adver- 
tised for  traffic  and  travel,  and  were  met  at  every 
important  point  by  stages  connecting  with  the 
neighboring  towns  and  villages.  This  method  of 
travelling  was  recommended  by  all  as  far  preferable 
to  the  jolting,  overcrowded  stage-coach. 

Until  1858  the  Erie  Canal  was  the  all-important 
transportation  route  between  the  Great  Lakes  and 
the  Atlantic.  Even  the  coming  of  the  railroad 
did  not  take  away  its  trade,  and  as  late  as  1862 
the  ton-mileage  of  canal  traffic  was  more  than 
double  the  combined  ton-mileage  of  the  New 
York  Central  and  the  Erie  railroads.  Twenty 
years  later  canal  tolls  were  abolished  and  the  canal 
became  a  free  waterway,  maintained  and  operated 
by  the  state.  Since  the  1862  enlargement  there 
has  been  no  permanent  improvement  of  any  im- 
portance of  the  canal  until  the  present  day.  With 
the  increase  of  railroad  traffic  and  the  hampering 
effect  of  the  conditions  of  forty  years  ago,  —  even 
the  same  style  of  boats,  and  horse  towage,  —  the 
canal  has  not  been  able  to  keep  pace  with  the 
railroad,  and  its  traffic  has  gradually  fallen  off, 


264         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

until  it  is  to-day  only  two-thirds  that  of  1868  and 
less  than  one-tenth  the  freight  tonnage  on  either 
the  New  York  Central  or  Erie  roads. 

A  committee  appointed  in  1899  investigated 
the  condition  of  the  canal  and  advised  enlargement 
of  its  bed.  Their  recommendations  were  ap- 
proved by  popular  vote  in  1903,  and  the  enlarge- 
ment is  now  in  progress.  The  new  canal  is  to  be 
navigable  by  steam-towed  barges  drawing  ten  feet 
of  water  and  having  a  carrying  capacity  of  at  least 
a  thousand  tons,  which  is  four  times  that  of  the 
largest  boat  in  use  on  the  existing  canal.  The 
route  is  also  to  be  considerably  changed.  River 
and  lake  channels  are  to  be  utilized  in  one-half 
the  new  part  of  the  route,  carrying  the  canal  north- 
ward along  the  line  of  the  Seneca  River  and  Oneida 
Lake  to  the  Mohawk,  and  away  from  Syracuse 
and  Rochester.  It  is  interesting  to  note  that  in 
making  use  of  river  and  water  beds  the  canal 
returns  more  nearly  to  the  route  of  the  old  Indian 
trail.  Improved  methods  of  engineering  will  do 
away  with  several  locks.  At  Waterford  on  the 
Hudson  five  locks  will  take  the  place  of  the  six- 
teen now  necessary  at  Cohoes  ;  at  Lockport  two 
locks  are  to  be  substituted  for  five.  The  minimum 
depth  of  the  channel  is  to  be  twelve  feet,  and  the 


The  Erie  Canal  265 

locks  are  to  be  at  least  three  hundred  and  twenty- 
eight  feet  long.  With  all  these  changes  it  is  esti- 
mated that  the  trip  from  Buffalo  to  New  York 
will  be  cut  down  from  ten  days  to  five,  and  that 
a  large  amount  of  traffic  will  turn  to  the  canal  as 
the  cheapest  and  most  satisfactory  method  of 
transportation. 


CHAPTER  XXI 

THE  GREAT  LAKES  IN  1840 

THE  decade  from  1830  to  1840  witnessed 
a  rush  of  people  to  the  country  of  the 
Great  Lakes.  As  pioneers  had  poured 
into  New  York  State  twenty  years  before  and 
changed  the  wilderness  into  a  settled  country,  so 
they  came  now  by  hundreds  and  thousands  into 
Ohio,  Michigan,  Illinois,  Indiana,  and  Wisconsin, 
clearing  away  the  forests  and  building  villages, 
towns,  and  cities  with  amazing  rapidity.  The 
common  phrase  of  gazetteers  of  that  day  about 
cities  like  Toledo,  Michigan  City,  Chicago,  and 
Milwaukee  is  that  in  1830-1834  this  place  was 
"  dense  forest,"  or  "  contained  a  solitary  family,0 
or  "  was  scarcely  known,"  but  now  in  1 840  it  has 
from  two  to  three  or  four  thousand  inhabitants, 
as  the  case  may  be  ;  and  the  tale  might  be  re- 
peated in  a  lesser  way  for  all  the  villages  and 
towns  of  the  region. 

In  a  few  years  Buffalo  and  Cleveland  changed 
266 


The  Great  Lakes  in  1840  267 

from  "  remote  settlements "  to  the  well-built, 
luxurious  eastern  gateways  through  which  rushed 
a  swift  and  ever-increasing  flood  of  emigrants. 
Mere  words  or  even  figures  can  hardly  convey 
what  this  movement  of  population  meant  to  the 
country.  It  was  said  that  in  1838  five  thousand 
people  left  Buffalo  in  one  day  to  go  up  the  lakes, 
and  the  larger  part  of  them  went  to  stay.  In 
1 8 1 1  Michigan  had  only  nine  principal  settle- 
ments, with  a  total  population  of  under  five  thou- 
sand, four-fifths  of  whom  were  French;  in  1837, 
when  she  was  admitted  as  a  state  into  the  Union, 
she  had  a  population  of  over  175,000,  distributed 
over  thirty-one  counties,  nearly  two-thirds  of 
whom  were  from  New  England  and  western  New 
York.  Together  the  five  states  of  Ohio,  Indiana, 
Illinois,  Michigan,  and  Wisconsin  had  come  in 
1837  to  have  nearly  three  million  inhabitants. 

Another  picture  of  the  rapid  growth  of  the 
country  is  given  in  the  successive  additions  to  a 
series  of  "  Travellers'  Guides,"  published  between 
1825  and  1840  by  Gideon  Davison.  He  wrote 
for  tourists,  not  emigrants,  and  entitled  each  book 
"The  Fashionable  Tour  in  1825"  or  whatever 
the  year  might  be.  In  the  first  edition,  published 
in  1825,  he  included  in  the  western  part  of  his 


268         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

journey  only  an  excursion  from  Albany  to  Niag- 
ara, and  thence  to  Montreal  and  Quebec.  Five 
years  later,  in  the  fourth  edition,  a  two-page  de- 
scription of  the  western  lakes  was  inserted,  with 
a  mention  of  Mackinac  and  Green  Bay,  military 
posts  which  steamboats  from  Buffalo  occasionally 
visited  during  the  summer.  A  footnote  an- 
nounced that  steamboats  left  Buffalo  for  Detroit 
every  other  day,  stopping  at  Erie,  Grand  River, 
Cleveland,  and  Sandusky  (cabin  fare  $15),  and 
a  line  of  boats  ran  daily  to  Erie.  All  description 
of  the  lakes  is,  however,  as  "  the  sources  of  the 
Niagara,  a  river  inferior  in  splendor  to  none, 
perhaps,  in  the  world,"  and  the  account  is  inserted 
to  give  a  more  adequate  idea  of  the  vast  amount 
of  water  united  in  this  "stupendous  river."  In 
1834  the  notice  of  these  steamboats  which  ran 
every  other  day  to  Detroit  in  forty  hours  is  set 
in  contrast  with  the  conditions  of  1811,  when  a 
passage  from  Buffalo  to  Detroit  required  from  five 
to  seven  days,  and  the  traveller  was  liable  to  wait 
ten  days  for  a  schooner  and  a  fair  wind.  In  the 
seventh  and  eighth  editions,  of  1837  and  1840, 
even  fashion  had  come  to  recognize  the  lakes. 
A  full  western  trip  on  Lakes  Erie,  Huron,  and 
Michigan,  is  outlined,  and  steamers  are  reported 


The  Great  Lakes  in  1840  269 

to  leave  Buffalo  for  Detroit  daily  in  1837  and 
twice  a  day  in  1840.  Had  the  editions  been 
continued  for  fifteen  years,  a  trip  to  Lake  Supe- 
rior would  have  been  included  ;  indeed,  it  began 
to  be  taken  by  1845  by  some  travellers. 

Davison's  guide-books  were  the  most  conserva- 
tive of  the  many  "  Companions,"  "  Directories," 
and  "  Gazetteers  with  Immigrant  Guides  "  pub- 
lished at  that  time.  Although  Davison  would 
not  send  his  tourist  so  far,  there  was  in  all  these 
years  a  rush  of  western  travel  on  the  lakes.  A 
guide-book  of  1825,  Davison's  first  year,  contains 
an  advertisement  of  the  steamboat  Superior,  which 
ran  between  Buffalo  and  Detroit  from  April  to 
November,  occupying  four  days  each  way  and 
landing  passengers  at  Cleveland  and  the  other 
main  settlements  "  unless  prevented  by  stress  of 
weather."  This  steamboat  had,  besides  its  prin- 
cipal cabin,  a  forward  room  fitted  up  especially 
for  families  moving  westward,  where  nothing  but 
ship  room  and  access  to  the  kitchen  was  supplied, 
and  the  fare  was  only  seven  dollars  and  a  half, 
one-half  the  regular  cabin  fare. 

A  landowner  from  Boston  published  in  1838  a 
little  book,  "  Illinois  and  the  West,"  which  aimed 
to  give  to  others  contemplating  land  purchases 


270         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

an  account  of  those  of  his  experiences  as  a  west- 
ern traveller  which  might  be  of  value  to  them. 
He  explained  the  simple  method  by  which  the 
government  divided  the  new  territories  and  states, 
and  sold  lots  to  newcomers.  The  whole  country 
was  surveyed  by  five  principal  meridian  lines  run- 
ning due  north  and  south,  and  intersected  by 
lines  running  east  and  west.  Parallel  in  both 
directions  to  these  main  lines  ran  lines  six  miles 
apart  which  divided  the  country  into  so-called 
townships  exactly  six  miles  square.  These  town- 
ships were  mere  geographical  divisions  and  had 
nothing  to  do  with  the  political  and  social  system 
of  villages  and  towns.  Indeed,  an  actual  town 
might  happen  to  be  in  two  or  even  three  of  these 
paper  townships.  At  the  government  land  of- 
fices, of  which  there  were  ten  in  Illinois,  were 
maps  on  which  these  six-mile  squares  were 
divided  in  their  turn  into  sections  a  mile  square, 
and  numbered  with  the  section  as  a  unit.  The 
section  was  not,  however,  the  unit  of  purchase, 
but  might  be  cut  according  to  the  wish  of  the 
buyer  and  the  character  of  the  land  into  fourths, 
eighths,  sixteenths,  and  even  "  fractions "  and 
"  excesses  and  deficiencies  "  as  proved  necessary. 
The  latter  divisions  were  only  used  when  the 


The  Great  Lakes  in   1840  271 

regular  system  had  to  be  interrupted  by  old  and 
irregular  claims,  or  streams,  or  parts  of  established 
townships.  From  the  agents  the  emigrant  could 
buy  a  sixteenth  of  a  section,  or  forty  acres,  for 
fifty  dollars.  As  the  western  fever  sent  the  first 
settlers  farther  west,  partially  cultivated  farms 
came  into  the  market,  and  by  1835  tne  Prices 
of  farms  ranged  from  two  to  ten  dollars  an  acre, 
according  to  the  amount  of  improvement  of  the 
property,  and  by  paying  the  higher  prices  a  new- 
comer could  avoid  the  first  clearing  of  the  land 
and  the  erection  of  a  log  cabin  or  frame-house. 
Such  an  opening  up  of  country  as  came  in  this 
decade  between  1830  and  1840  attracted  many 
travellers  to  the  lake  region.  By  picturing  from 
their  various  accounts  a  "  Grand  Tour  "  of  the 
lakes  as  it  was  taken  by  many  a  person  between 
1837  and  1843,  we  can  get  tne  Dest  idea  °f  tne 
various  settlements.  The  traveller  usually  came 
up  the  Erie  Canal  and  started  from  Buffalo, 
taking  from  there  one  of  the  well-appointed 
steamers  of  from  four  hundred  to  seven  hundred 
tons  which  left  in  the  morning  and  evening  for 
Detroit.  This  trip  would  always  be  taken  in  the 
summer,  for  during  the  four  or  five  months  when 
the  lake  was  closed  Detroit  could  only  be  reached 


272          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

by  a  stage  journey  of  three  hundred  and  seventy 
miles  along  the  shore  of  Lake  Erie.  The  towns 
of  Erie,  Cleveland,  and  Sandusky  were  the  main 
stops  between  Buffalo  and  Detroit,  but  between 
them  was  a  succession  of  villages  which  were  just 
beginning  to  give  signs  of  their  future  importance 
as  the  terminus  of  some  railroad  or  canal.  The 
steamer  sailed  along  the  southern  edge  of  the 
lake,  keeping  always  in  sight  of  land,  and  gave 
the  passengers  a  good  view  of  Dunkirk,  a  little 
village  which  was  waiting  for  the  completion  of 
the  New  York  and  Erie  Railroad,  and  of  the 
towns  of  Portland  and  Erie.  This  last-named 
had  always  been  the  point  at  which  to  turn 
southward  into  Pennsylvania,  and  was  now  made 
all  the  more  important  by  the  termination  there 
of  the  Pennsylvania  and  Erie  Canal,  which  con- 
nected Lake  Erie  with  Pittsburg.  Between 
Erie  and  Cleveland,  Conneaut,  Ashtabula,  and 
Grand  River  were  the  principal  settlements. 

Cleveland  had  been  incorporated  as  a  city  in 
1836,  and  was  rightly  considered  one  of  the  most 
attractive  cities  of  the  West.  Standing  on  a  plain 
eighty  feet  above  the  surface  of  the  lake,  from 
the  steamer's  deck  it  made  a  beautiful  picture. 
Above  the  roofs  of  the  well-built  brick  blocks 


The  Great  Lakes  in   1840  273 

and  the  residences  in  their  carefully  laid-out  rows, 
towered  the  white  dome  of  the  court-house,  four 
church  spires,  and  the  turrets  of  its  hotels.  The 
hotels  of  the  city  were  particularly  praised  by 
travellers.  On  the  roofs  of  the  two  principal 
ones,  the  "  American  "  and  the  "  Franklin,"  were 
towers  in  which  sentinels  stood  on  watch  day  and 
night,  keeping  a  lookout  for  vessels  and  notifying 
those  below  of  their  approach  in  time  to  send 
runners  to  the  wharf  to  meet  the  guests.  The 
remarkable  growth  of  the  town  in  the  last  few 
years  was  particularly  attributed  to  its  being  the 
terminus  of  the  Ohio  and  Erie  Canal,  making 
it  one  of  the  principal  routes  of  trade  and  travel 
from  the  Ohio.  Along  this  canal  a  side  excur- 
sion to  Cincinnati  and  Columbus  was  often  made. 
From  Cleveland  the  boat  proceeded  with  only 
two  stops,  at  Black  River  and  Huron,  to  San- 
dusky  Bay,  and  steamed  past  the  lighthouse  and 
up  the  carefully  staked-out  channel  to  the  town 
of  Sandusky,  which  was  at  the  bottom  of  the 
seven-mile  inlet.  This  town  had  the  fresh,  bright 
appearance  of  all  the  recently  built  settlements, 
with  an  added  air  of  substantiality  which  it  owed 
to  the  abundance  near  by  of  good  building  ma- 
terial, which  had  led  the  inhabitants  to  erect  fine 


274         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

stone  residences.  After  a  brief  stop  the  steamer 
ran  out  of  the  bay  and  northward  across  the  lake 
to  the  mouth  of  the  Detroit  River,  passing  on 
the  way  the  islands  near  which  Commodore 
Perry  won  his  victory.  At  the  entrance  of  the 
strait  on  the  Canada  side  was  the  town  of  Am- 
herstburgh,  formerly  known  as  Maiden,  and  the 
scene  of  much  fighting  in  the  War  of  1812.  All 
the  twenty  miles  of  shore  from  here  to  Detroit 
were  lined  with  pretty  villas  and  gardens,  many 
of  them  of  the  old  French  style. 

To  the  traveller  of  1840  as  to  the  tourist  of 
to-day,  Detroit  made  from  the  water  a  most 
pleasing  picture.  For  a  mile  along  the  bank 
of  the  river  and  half  a  mile  back  from  the  water 
stretched  regular  avenues  with  large  white  houses 
and  green  patches  of  gardens  interspersed,  and 
in  the  centre  of  the  city  were  the  court-house  with 
its  dome  and  turrets,  the  churches  with  their  tall 
spires,  and  the  blocks  of  solid  brick  business 
buildings.  The  low-lying  French  buildings  had 
disappeared,  and  with  them  the  French  atmosphere 
of  twenty  years  before.  Detroit  had  become  in 
the  last  ten  years  a  busy  port  and  thoroughfare 
for  the  emigrants  who  yearly  composed  one-half 
or  even  two-thirds  of  the  city  population.  Even 


The  Great  Lakes  in   1840  275 

in  1830  they  were  arriving  by  the  thousands, — 
ten,  even  fifteen  thousand  in  a  single  season.  In 
May  of  that  year  the  Free  Press  of  the  city  an- 
nounced that  besides  those  arriving  by  land  or  by 
sailing  vessels,  over  two  thousand  people  had 
come  in  that  one  week  on  the  seven  steamboats. 
In  1836  a  diligent  citizen  kept  watch  of  those 
who  came  and  went,  and  computed  that,  in  the 
twelve  hours  between  daylight  and  dark,  a  wagon 
left  the  city  for  the  interior  every  five  minutes. 

The  pioneers  who  had  started  out  from  Detroit 
in  1832-1834  to  found  Chicago  and  the  other 
towns  beyond,  had  to  go  in  primitive  fashion  by 
mail-coach,  by  flatboats  with  Indian  guides,  by 
schooner,  or  whatever  conveyance  they  could  get 
for  any  part  of  the  way.  For  the  traveller  of 
1840  there  were  three  regular  and  established 
routes  by  any  one  of  which  he  would  be 
reasonably  comfortable.  One  was  by  steamer 
through  the  lakes,  but  this  he  more  com- 
monly took  on  his  return  trip.  A  second 
was  by  railroad  to  Ypsilanti,  thirty-three  miles 
away,  from  which  a  regular  line  of  stages  ran  to 
St.  Joseph  on  Lake  Michigan,  one  hundred  and 
seventy  miles  across  the  state,  and  thence  by 
steamer  the  remaining  ninety-two  miles  to  Chi- 


2y  6         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

cago.  The  stages  travelled  along  the  govern- 
ment road  (about  twenty  miles  north  of  the 
present  boundary  of  the  state)  and  found  the 
whole  way  lined  with  tiny  hamlets  and  cleared 
farms  in  the  midst  of  dense  forests.  The  most 
common  route  lay  just  south  of  this  with  Toledo 
as  a  starting-point.  The  traveller  would  take 
the  steamer  down  the  Detroit  River  and  along 
the  western  end  of  the  lake  and  go  up  the 
Maumee  River  nine  miles  to  Toledo,  a  town 
of  three  or  four  thousand  people,  destined,  said 
the  guide-book,  to  be  a  place  of  much  impor- 
tance. As  by  the  other  route,  he  could  go  thirty- 
three  miles  by  railroad,  this  time  to  Adrian, 
which  was  as  far  as  the  road  had  been  built,  and 
thence  across  the  state  through  the  newly  oc- 
cupied country  to  Michigan  City,  Indiana,  which 
was  then  the  "  commercial  depot "  for  the  entire 
northern  part  of  that  state.  This  town  was  soon 
to  be  benefited  by  a  branch  from  Fort  Wayne 
of  the  Wabash  and  Erie  Canal,  which  was 
then  in  progress  and  was  to  find  its  outlet  at 
Toledo.  This  route  left  only  a  trip  of  fifty-five 
miles  by  water  to  Chicago. 

At  Chicago  the  visitor  stopped  to  wonder,  as 
men  have  stopped  to  wonder  ever  since.     The 


The  Great  Lakes  in   1840  277 

splendid  location  of  the  town  as  a  commercial 
thoroughfare  between  the  lakes  and  the  Missis- 
sippi had  made  it  an  easy  victim  to  the  land- 
boom  of  1834  and  1835,  and  Mr.  Buckingham, 
visiting  there  in  1840,  was  told  by  persons  who 
had  been  present  at  the  time  that  building  lots 
on  streets  only  marked  out  on  paper  had  been 
sold  over  and  over  again  in  a  day,  with  an 
advance  of  price  each  time  until  the  evening 
purchaser  was  likely,  at  the  very  least,  to  pay  ten 
times  as  much  as  the  morning  buyer  of  the  same 
lot.  Chicago  had,  however,  been  able  to  survive 
the  succeeding  panic  in  1837,  which  swamped  for 
the  time  being  several  smaller  towns.  It  was  now 
a  prosperous  trading  centre  of  six  thousand 
people.  The  town  was  planned  with  the  sym- 
metry of  all  these  newly  built  cities,  and  the 
streets  were  of  good  width  with  rows  of  trees 
separating  the  plank  sidewalks  from  the  main 
road.  None  of  the  streets  were  as  yet  paved  ; 
and  indeed  many  of  them  had  still  the  green  turf 
of  the  prairie  grass  in  the  centre.  So  scarce  was 
stone  and  so  high  was  labor  that  a  small  piece  of 
flagstone  pavement  around  the  Lake  House 
Hotel  had  cost  nine  hundred  dollars,  —  an 
extravagance  which  no  one  else  had  yet  com- 


The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

mitted.  On  the  south  side  of  the  river  were  the 
stores,  many  of  them  built  of  brick,  and  the 
main  street  was  a  busy  trading  mart.  There 
were  in  the  city  six  churches,  four  hotels,  banks, 
and  insurance  offices,  and  along  the  water  front 
stretched  a  growing  line  of  warehouses.  The 
fashionable  residential  district  was  on  the  north 
side  of  the  river,  where  were  avenues  of  large 
villas  surrounded  by  gardens.  Between  the  two 
parts  ran  a  ferry-boat,  drawn  across  the  river  by 
a  rope,  and  passing  and  repassing  every  five 
minutes.  This  was  maintained  by  subscription 
among  the  inhabitants,  and  no  fee  was  therefore 
charged  for  crossing. 

Margaret  Fuller  spent  the  summer  of  1 843  on 
the  lakes,  and  left  a  charming  account  of  her 
impressions.  Chicago  she  found  rather  commer- 
cial, "  with  no  provision  for  the  student  or  the 
idler,"  but  she  recognized  its  commanding  posi- 
tion. "  There  can  be  no  two  places  in  the  world 
more  completely  thoroughfares,"  she  says,  "  than 
this  place  and  Buffalo."  They  were  to  her  two 
correspondent  valves  that  opened  and  shut  all 
the  time,  as  the  life  blood  rushed  from  east  to 
west  and  back  again.  Yet,  even  in  this  business 
place,  she  saw  for  the  first  time  in  her  drives 


The  Great  Lakes  in   1840  279 

along  the  lake  shore  the  beautiful  prairie  flowers 
of  the  West.  To  her  the  most  picturesque  sight 
in  all  Chicago  were  the  lines  of  Hoosier  wagons, 
in  which  the  rough  farmers  who  had  driven  in 
from  the  country  camped  on  the  edge  of  the  city, 
living  on  their  own  supplies  of  provisions  and 
seeming  as  they  walked  about  the  town  like 
foreign  peasantry  put  down  among  the  "  active, 
inventive  business  people "  of  Chicago.  With 
the  characteristically  sharp  contrasts  of  this  won- 
derful new  land,  the  other  sight  which  interested 
her  especially  was  the  arrival  of  the  great  lake 
steamers,  magnificent  floating  palaces  of  six  and 
eight  hundred  tons,  which  "panted  in  from  their 
rapid  and  marvellous  journey "  of  a  thousand 
miles  from  Buffalo.  When  she  went  out  to 
watch  the  lights  of  these  boats  as  they  came  in 
at  night  she  heard  as  she  walked  along  on  one 
side  the  Hoosier  dialect,  on  another,  cultivated 
French,  and  the  very  next  moment  the  sounds 
of  German,  Dutch,  and  Irish.  Then  as  now 
Chicago  was  a  cosmopolitan  city. 

Miss  Fuller  found  the  boats  so  comfortable 
that  her  trip  to  Milwaukee  was  a  "pleasure 
party."  The  beautiful  situation  of  this  town  on 
a  bluflF  eighty  feet  above  Lake  Michigan  made 


280         The   Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

a  great  impression  on  all  visitors.  If  the  other 
towns  had  grown  up  recently  and  rapidly,  Mil- 
waukee could  be  seen  in  the  very  process.  With 
a  population  of  only  two  thousand  people,  who 
were  erecting  buildings  as  quickly  as  they  could  on 
newly  laid-out  broad  avenues,  it  had  received  in 
one  week  from  Buffalo  three  thousand  emigrants 
on  their  way  to  the  interior,  not  to  mention 
the  numbers  which  came  weekly  from  Chicago 
and  Ohio.  Here,  as  at  Chicago,  Miss  Fuller  was 
delighted  at  the  gathering  of  pleasant  people 
drawn  from  all  over  the  world.  The  great 
interest  of  the  town  was  in  its  new  arrivals. 
Boats  came  and  went  every  day,  and  crowds 
swarmed  down  to  the  pier  to  meet  them.  The 
poorer  emigrants  who  landed  were  taken  to  rude 
"  shantees  "  in  a  particular  part  of  the  town,  and 
then  walked  off  the  next  morning  into  the 
country,  "  the  mothers  carrying  the  babies,  and 
the  fathers  leading  the  little  children."  She 
stayed  only  a  fortnight  at  Milwaukee,  but  she 
declares  that  had  she  been  rich  in  money  she 
might  in  that  time  have  built  a  house  or  set 
herself  up  in  business,  so  swiftly  did  matters 
move  there. 

Leaving    Milwaukee    Miss    Fuller    went    by 


The  Great  Lakes  in   1840  281 

steamer,  as  did  all  lake  travellers,  to  Mackinac, 
crossing  Lake  Michigan  and  passing  near  the 
beautiful  western  shores  of  the  state  of  that 
name.  All  steamers  stopped  at  Manitoulin  Is- 
land for  wood.  They  could  not  carry  the  very 
large  amount  of  this  fuel  needed  for  their  thou- 
sand-mile trips  without  so  lumbering  the  decks  as 
to  lose  the  necessary  space  for  passengers  and 
cargo.  So  they  must  stop  at  this  way-place  and 
pay  to  the  twenty  wood-cutters  who  lived  there 
an  exorbitant  price  for  wood  enough  to  carry 
them  the  remaining  one  hundred  miles  to  Mack- 
inac. As  the  engines  consumed  a  cord  and  a 
half  an  hour,  the  decks,  immediately  after  the 
taking  on  of  a  new  supply,  were  heavily  loaded 
down,  so  that  even  the  windows  of  the  staterooms 
were  darkened  until  the  piles  began  to  diminish. 

Mackinac,  or  Mackinaw,  was  out  of  the  path 
of  emigration  and  had  scarcely  changed  in  the 
last  thirty  years.  Always  a  centre  for  Indian 
traders  and  American  Fur  Company  buyers,  it 
was  doubly  picturesque  when  Margaret  Fuller 
reached  there  in  August,  1843,  f°r  over  two 
thousand  Indians  had  just  come  in  from  distant 
villages  and  made  their  camps,  waiting  for  trade 
and  for  the  annual  payments  made  them  by  the 


282          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

government.  Of  the  beauty  of  the  scenery  and 
of  the  interest  of  these  constantly  arriving  Indian 
parties  Miss  Fuller  could  not  say  enough.  She 
stayed  there  nearly  a  fortnight,  and  made  one 
day  an  excursion  by  steamer  up  to  Sault  Ste. 
Marie,  where  two  Indians  took  her  in  a  canoe 
through  the  rapids.  To  all  travellers  the  days 
on  the  Strait  of  Mackinac  were  among  the  most 
pleasant  of  the  trip,  but  when  the  steamer  came 
from  Chicago  they  reluctantly  bade  farewell  to  its 
beauties  and  sailed  down  the  transparent  waters 
of  Lake  Huron  to  the  strait  which  led  into  Lake 
St.  Clair  and  across  that  lake  to  Detroit,  and 
thence  back  along  Lake  Erie,  as  they  had  come, 
to  Buffalo. 

In  taking  the  cc  Grand  Tour "  with  one  of 
these  travellers,  we  have  gained  a  picture  of  the 
beginnings  of  the  western  lake  states  and  of  the 
rapid  progress  of  the  eastern  ones  in  a  time  not  > 
remote  and  distant,  but  scarcely  seventy  years 
ago.  The  accomplishment  of  so  much  in  so 
short  a  time  well  deserved  the  adjectives  and 
encomiums  that  were  bestowed  upon  it  by  admir- 
ing travellers,  who  little  dreamed  of  the  vast 
changes  that  were  to  take  place  in  the  century 
to  come. 


CHAPTER   XXII 

THE    COMING    OF    THE    RAILROAD    TO    LAKE    ERIE 

LAKE  Erie  became  in  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury the  portal  of  the  Great  Lakes.  To 
her  shores  came  from  the  east  an  army  of 
immigrants  pouring  into  the  states  beyond,  and 
from  these  regions,  as  they  became  populated,  came 
back  an  immense  volume  of  produce  to  be  carried 
to  the  cities  of  the  east  and  the  south.  These 
conditions  led  the  citizens  of  the  lake  shore 
promptly  to  adopt  any  new  means  of  transporta- 
tion. In  its  day  they  had  welcomed  the  turnpike 
and  built  many  roads  into  the  interior.  During 
the  era  of  canal-building  the  people  of  New  York, 
Pennsylvania,  Ohio,  and  Indiana  had  spent  hun- 
dreds of  thousands  of  dollars  on  artificial  water- 
ways. In  1 840  five  canals  over  a  thousand  miles 
in  length,  not  including  their  many  branches, 
opened  into  Lake  Erie.  The  Welland  Canal 
united  it  with  Lake  Ontario,  the. Erie  with  the 
Hudson,  while  the  Ohio  and  Erie  connected 

283 


284         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

Cleveland  with  Columbus  and  the  Ohio  and  also 
with  the  Pennsylvania  Canal  and  thus  with  Pitts- 
burg;  and  from  Toledo  and  the  Maumee  River 
the  Miami  Canal  went  south  to  Cincinnati,  and 
the  Wabash  and  Erie  west  to  Lafayette,  Indiana. 
This  remarkable  group  of  canals  had  been  built 


BY  CANAL  AND  RAILROAD 
TO 

LAKE  ERIE 

=====  Canal 
.'in Railroad 


in  twenty  years.  No  less  wonderful  was  the  build- 
ing of  railroad  lines  in  the  next  two  decades  ;  and 
to  us  who  are  accustomed  to  limited  trains  and 
"  flyers  "  the  story  of  the  first  trains  is  one  of 
curious  interest. 

Ohio  and  Michigan  were  progressive  in  the 
matter  of  building  railroads.  Michigan  gave  a 
charter  to  the  Michigan  Central  in  1830,  and  in 
1832,  when  there  were  only  two  hundred  and 
twenty-nine  miles  of  railroad  in  operation  in  the 


Coming  of  the  Railroad  to  Lake  Erie     285 

United  States,  the  Ohio  legislature  granted  a 
charter  for  the  construction  of  a  road  from  San- 
dusky  to  Dayton,  a  distance  of  over  one  hundred 
and  fifty  miles.  These  early  dates  are  rather  an 
exhibition  of  good  intentions  and  foresight  than 
a  measure  of  actual  achievement,  for  neither  road 
was  begun  until  1837  and  then  each  was  car- 
ried but  a  few  miles.  All  railroad-building  about 
the  lakes  until  nearly  the  middle  of  the  century 
was  a  matter  of  crude  and  small  beginnings,  but 
it  is  these  very  beginnings  which  make  us  realize 
the  transformations  that  have  taken  place  within 
less  than  eighty  years. 

The  first  railroad  to  be  built  in  Ohio  was  the 
Kalamazoo  and  Erie  from  Toledo,  Ohio,  to 
Adrian,  Michigan.  This  was  later  bought  up 
by  the  Michigan  Southern  road  and  was  the 
first  link  in  the  route  to  Chicago,  taken,  as  will 
be  remembered,  by  our  traveller  of  1840.  It 
was  thirty-three  miles  long  and  was  a  typical 
early  railroad.  Seven-eighths  of  it  was  built  in 
unbroken  forest,  and  one-third  through  a  densely 
timbered  swamp  where  malaria  and  mosquitoes 
made  the  lives  of  the  workmen  miserable.  The 
track  was  built  of  oak  stringers,  or  long  wooden 
beams,  upon  which  were  fastened  strips  of  iron 


286          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

five-eighths  of  an  inch  thick  and  two  and  a  half 
inches  wide.  These  rails  were  supported  by 
wooden  cross-ties  placed  about  four  feet  apart 
and  resting  securely  on  a  heavy  foundation  of 
broken  stone.  The  cars  were  built  after  the 
fashion  of  the  body  of  a  stage-coach,  or  rather 
of  three  stage-coaches  put  together,  and  were 
set  on  a  four-wheeled  truck  instead  of  directly 
on  wheels,  to  make  it  possible  for  them  to 
swing  round  on  curves.  The  conductor  walked 
along  an  outside  footboard  to  collect  fares. 
These  cars  opened  at  either  end  and  seated 
about  twenty-four  persons,  who  faced  to  the  front. 
On  the  Toledo  road  a  horse  track  was  laid  be- 
tween the  rails,  and  the  road  was  used  for  one 
year  with  horse  power.  In  1837  a  locomotive 
was  purchased  and  steam  power  was  substituted. 
For  ten  years  American  builders  had  been 
experimenting  with  types  of  locomotives  and  had 
adopted  a  pattern  which  has  persisted  to  this  day 
in  its  principles,  although  it  has  been  much 
changed  in  details  and  size.  The  fore  part  of 
the  engine  was  placed  on  a  four-wheeled  truck 
and  fastened  to  it  with  a  bolt,  which  allowed 
the  truck  to  swing  some  distance  and  thus  to 
round  sharp  curves  safely.  The  back  part  rested 


Coming  of  the  Railroad  to  Lake  Erie     287 

on  four  connected  driving  wheels.  An  engine 
of  this  type  had  been  built  in  1836  in  Phila- 
delphia, and  was  speedily  adopted  elsewhere.  It 
weighed  about  ten  tons  when  water  and  coal 
tanks  were  loaded,  and  would  seem  to  us  to-day 
a  crude  and  small  affair,  but  it  was  better  suited 
to  wooden  rails  than  a  heavier  engine  would 
have  been.  Passengers  paid  four  and  a  half 
cents  a  mile  to  be  carried  on  this  Toledo  rail- 
road at  a  speed  of  less  than  ten  miles  an  hour. 
The  leisureliness  and  timidity  of  the  first  trains 
would  seem  to  us  amazing,  did  we  not  remember 
how  tiny  the  engine  was,  how  unstable  the  road- 
bed, and  how  loosely  the  cars  were  coupled  to- 
gether by  bolt  and  pin.  Twenty  years  after  this 
first  road  was  built  one  of  the  printed  instructions 
to  engineers  was  to  be  perfectly  sure  before  they 
pulled  out  of  the  station  that  they  had  their  en- 
tire train  with  them  and  had  dropped  no  cars  in 
starting.  At  first  it  was  the  custom  for  the 
engineer  to  stop  the  train  to  collect  fares,  or  for 
any  other  urgent  business  connected  with  the 
road.  It  was  many  years  before  the  companies 
dared  run  night  trains.  The  Michigan  Central, 
which  was  opened  in  1837,  found  in  the  autumn 
of  1841  that  its  depots  were  so  loaded  with 


288         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

barrels  of  flour  and  cords  of  wood  that  they 
would  not  be  able  to  get  it  all  to  Detroit  before 
the  close  of  navigation  on  the  lakes.  The  di- 
rectors conferred  together  and  hired  teams  to 
transport  the  goods  from  stations  near  Detroit  to 
that  place.  For  the  long  distances  they  had  no 
alternative  but  to.  put  one  of  their  four  locomo- 
tives on  for  night  service,  but  they  considered  it 
unsafe  and  hoped  that  such  extreme  measures 
would  not  be  necessary  in  the  future.  When 
this  road  had  been  opened,  four  years  before,  an 
adventurous  young  man  who  owned  a  sorrel  pony 
announced  that  he  was  going  to  race  the  train  for 
the  last  mile  before  it  reached  Dearborn.  The 
crowds  who  had  been  assembled  to  see  the  first 
train  come  in  were  much  excited  over  the  com- 
petition, and,  needless  to  say,  the  pony  won. 

After  the  completion  of  these  and  other  short 
roads  there  was  a  lull  in  railroad-building,  due  to 
the  hard  times  in  the  western  country  which  suc- 
ceeded the  panic  of  1837.  In  1845  and  1846  the 
legislatures  began  once  more  to  plan  internal  im- 
provements, and  a  great  era  of  railroad-building 
began  which  continued  until  the  opening  of  the 
Civil  War.  In  the  history  of  Lake  Erie  1851 
stands  out  as  the  year  when  three  of  the  trunk 


Coming  of  the   Railroad  to   Lake  Erie     289 

lines  were  completed  and  their  opening  fittingly 
celebrated.  In  that  year  the  first  train  came  into 
Cleveland,  and  with  the  thought  of  the  hundreds 
of  trains  that  enter  its  stations  daily,  let  us  put 
ourselves  back  into  the  city  of  1851  and  watch 
the  first  train  arrive. 

The  state  legislature  had  voted  to  loan  to  the 
credit  of  the  city  $200,000  for  the  construction 
of  the  Cleveland,  Columbus,  and  Cincinnati 
Railroad.  In  1851  the  road-bed  of  two  hundred 
and  sixty-three  miles  was  completed,  and  on  the 
morning  of  February  21  was  formally  opened 
by  the  passage  over  the  road  of  a  party  of  four 
hundred  and  twenty-eight  persons,  who  took  the 
train  from  Columbus  and  Cincinnati  to  Cleveland, 
the  "  city  of  the  Lake  Shore."  The  party  was 
made  up  of  members  of  the  legislature,  officers  of 
the  state,  the  councils  of  both  cities,  and  many 
citizens.  The  road  over  which  these  people 
travelled  was  a  very  different  one  from  the 
Toledo  road  of  fourteen  years  before,  and  from 
the  number  of  people  accommodated  it  is  evident 
that  the  passenger  coaches  were  very  different, 
also.  Iron  rails  had  taken  the  place  of  wooden 
ones,  and  heavier  locomotives  and  more  comfort- 
able cars  had  been  built.  When  the  excursion 


290         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

train  reached  the  city  of  Cleveland,  thousands  of 
citizens  were  lined  up  along  the  track  and  about 
the  station  and  the  cannon  of  the  city  boomed 
out  a  loud  welcome  to  the  incoming  guests.  The 
party  had  arrived  late  in  the  day,  as  it  was  a 
twelve-hour  journey.  The  next  morning  a 
procession  of  Cleveland  people  was  formed,  with 
General  Sanford  as  chief  marshal,  to  escort  the 
guests  to  the  public  square  in  front  of  the  court- 
house, where  the  mayor  received  them  with  a 
speech  of  welcome.  He  was  followed  by  Mr. 
Convers,  speaker  of  the  senate,  Mr.  Starkweather, 
who  spoke  for  the  people  of  Cleveland,  three 
gentlemen  from  Cincinnati,  and  the  governor  of 
the  state,  Mr.  Wood,  who  was  a  Cleveland  resi- 
dent. Last  on  the  programme  came  Mr.  Cyrus 
Prentiss,  the  president  of  the  Cleveland  and 
Pittsburg  Railroad,  forty  miles  of  which  were  also 
opened  that  day.  This  road  ran  to  Ravenna, 
where  passengers  could  take  the  canal  packet  to 
Beaver  River,  and  there  transfer  to  a  steamboat 
for  Pittsburg.  Mr.  Prentiss  invited  the  guests  to 
take  an  excursion  on  that  road.  After  that  trip 
they  returned  to  a  banquet  and  grand  torchlight 
procession  in  the  evening. 

In  their   pulpits  on  Sunday  the  ministers  dis- 


Coming  of  the  Railroad  to  Lake  Erie     291 

coursed  on  the  wonderful  event  that  had  taken 
place,  the  arrival  of  the  railroad,  and  on  Monday 
morning  the  people  gathered  from  all  the  region 
round  to  see  the  strange  iron  horse  start  back 
across  the  state  with  its  load.  Just  before  the 
train  pulled  out  of  the  station,  one  of  the  visiting 
party  sang  a  humorous  song,  describing  the  effect 
of  the  trip  upon  the  interior  regions  of  the  state. 
He  told  of  the  delight  and  astonishment  of 
mothers  and  children  in  their  log  cabins,  and  of 
wood-choppers  of  the  back  country  as  they  had 
looked  up  and  seen  this  "  snorting  iron  horse 
with  the  long  tail "  race  through  the  country. 
He  ended  his  song  with  praise  of  the  governor 
Cleveland  had  given  the  state  and  of  Cleveland 

itself, 

ff  The  beautiful  city,  the  forest-tree  city, 
The  city  upon  the  lake  shore." 

The  opening  up  of  the  Venango  oil-district  in 
Pennsylvania  in  1858  brought  to.  Cleveland  a 
large  refining  and  shipping  industry,  for  which 
it  was  well  fitted  by  its  advantageous  position  on 
the  lake  and  its  railroads  and  vessels. 

Two  months  later  a  similar  occasion  took  place 
in  the  little  village  of  Dunkirk,  Pennsylvania, 
when  the  New  York  and  Erie  road  was  com- 


292          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

pleted.  This  line  crossed  the  state  of  New 
York  some  seventy  miles  south  of  the  Albany 
turnpike  and  New  York  Central  route,  and  with 
its  completion  the  Great  Lakes  and  the  Atlantic 
were  once  more  united  and  the  occasion  was 
celebrated  as  if  such  an  idea  had  never  entered 
the  minds  of  any  one  before.  President  Fill- 
more  and  Daniel  Webster,  his  Secretary  of  State, 
with  three  other  members  of  the  cabinet,  came  on 
from  Washington  and  took  the  trip  on  the  first 
train  over  the  road.  In  New  York  City  and  all 
along  the  way  there  was  great  excitement,  and  in 
the  little  village  of  Dunkirk  grand  prepara- 
tions had  been  going  on  for  weeks.  The  train 
arrived  at  four-thirty  on  the  afternoon  of 
May  15.  As  it  rolled  into  the  station  the 
church  bells  rang,  cannon  roared,  and  a  salute 
of  thirteen  guns  was  fired  from  the  United  States 
steamship  Michigan^  which  was  stationed  in  the 
harbor.  The  cars  passed  under  a  canopy  of 
French,  American,  and  British  flags,  and  beyond 
the  engine  at  the  very  end  of  the  track  was  an 
arch  of  evergreen  and  flowers  built  over  an  old 
plough  on  which  was  printed  the  word  "  Finis."  x 
This  was  the  plough  used  to  break  ground  for 
the  first  ten-mile  section  of  the  road  at  Dunkirk 
in  1838. 


\ 


Coming  of  the  Railroad  to  Lake  Erie     293 

The  distinguished  visitors  formed  in  a  proces- 
sion and  marched  about  the  town,  to  be  welcomed 
by  the  mayor  before  they  entered  the  huge  shed 
erected  for  the  occasion.  Over  the  table,  three 
hundred  feet  long,  hung  two  barbecued  oxen  sus- 
pended on  poles.  Upon  the  table  were  ten  sheep 
roasted  whole.  Bread  had  been  baked  in  loaves 
ten  feet  long  by  two  thick,  which  it  took  two  men 
to  carry.  Even  the  pork  and  beans  were  in  tin 
vessels  holding  fifty  gallons  each,  and  barrels  of 
cider  were  set  at  intervals  along  the  side  of  the 
table.  The  presidential  party  looked,  admired, 
and  praised  —  and  then  returned  to  the  hotel  for  a 
collation,  leaving  the  sampling  of  these  triumphs 
of  the  culinary  art  to  the  other  guests  of  the 
occasion. 

From  the  window  of  the  hotel  the  great  men 
made  speeches  in  the  evening,  President  Fillmore 
and  Senator  Douglas  leading  and  being  followed 
by  ex-Governor  Seward  and  others.  This  group 
was  of  great  interest  to  the  political  world  as  hav- 
ing six  presidential  candidates  in  its  ranks  —  Fill- 
more,  Crittenden,  Douglas,  Seward,  Marcy,  and 
Webster.  The  last-named  was  to  have  spoken 
that  night,  but  he  was  so  hoarse  from  previous 
efforts  that  he  could  only  say  a  few  words  in 


294          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

answer  to  the  calls  of  the  people  for  him,  and 
postponed  his  speech  until  the  next  night.  With 
suitable  eclat,  the  ocean  and  the  lakes  were  once 
more  "  forever  united,"  this  time  in  very  truth,  by 
a  service  which  took  only  twenty  hours  in  contrast 
to  the  three  days  of  the  Erie  Canal.  In  the  words 
of  one  of  the  banners  in  the  hall,  cc  'Tis  done,  — 
'tis  done,  the  mighty  chain  that  binds  bright  Erie 
to  the  main." 

"  Bright  Erie  "  was  not  yet  connected  as  closely 
as  the  public  might  naturally  demand,  as  was 
shown  by  the  famous  Erie  war  of  1853.  On  all 
the  roads  between  what  are  to-day  the  great  cities 
of  the  country  there  ran  one  or  at  most  two  trains 
a  day.  Even  on  the  New  York  and  Erie  itself, 
which  was  one  of  the  fastest  and  best  equipped  in 
the  matter  of  service,  the  mail  train  ran  one-half 
the  distance  in  one  day,  and  then  stopped  over- 
night at  Elmira  before  it  proceeded  on  its  way. 
These  arrangements  made  it  very  necessary  that 
the  traveller  should  make  good  connections  and 
that  the  various  roads  should  run  in  harmony,  for 
each  piece  was  operated  by  a  separate  company. 
Besides  this  there  was  another  complication. 
The  tracks  of  different  roads  were  of  different 
gauges  or  widths,  so  that  the  train  of  one  could 


Coming  of  the  Railroad  to  Lake  Erie     295 

not  by  any  possibility  be  run  on  another.  This 
condition  of  affairs  was  particularly  bad  at  Erie, 
twenty  miles  beyond  Dunkirk,  where  all  pas- 
sengers had  to  leave  the  cars,  ride  across  the  town 
in  omnibuses,  or  walk  a  mile  to  the  other  station, 
and  if  connections  failed,  as  they  often  did,  dine 
or  even  stay  overnight  in  the  town.  This  state 
of  affairs  was  satisfactory  to  the  local  hotel  and 
baggage  men  and  others  who  gained  from  the 
opportunities  offered  by  a  large  transfer  of  bag- 
gage and  people,  but  it  was  very  annoying  to 
travellers.  The  railroad  manager  of  the  eastern 
road  decided  to  alter  the  gauge  of  his  road  and 
attempt  an  arrangement  by  which  passengers 
could  be  carried  through  direct  to  Cleveland. 
He  began  by  buying  up  all  the  stock  he  could  of 
the  other  line.  This  was  the  pioneer  attempt  at 
a  railroad  merger  and  resulted  in  one  of  the  most 
bitter  local  wars  the  country  has  ever  known, 
involving  every  one  in  the  region  and  the  people 
of  both  states  in  a  protracted  and  very  serious 
struggle.  The  issue  was  complicated  and  inten- 
sified by  state  and  railroad  rivalry,  but  the  whole 
affair  began  because  the  people  of  Erie  were  un- 
willing to  be  made  a  "  way-station/'  as  they  termed 
it,  on  a  through  route  and  thus  lose  the  commer- 


296         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

cial  advantages  of  being  a  terminus  for  railroads 
and  steamboat  lines. 

On  the  morning  of  December  7,  1853,  the 
citizens  of  Erie  were  summoned  by  the  ringing 
of  the  court-house  bell.  Men  rushed  to  the 
centre  of  the  town  to  find  that  the  eastern  rail- 
road company  had  begun  work  at  the  state  line 
altering  their  road  from  their  four-feet-ten-inches 
gauge  to  the  six-foot  width  of  the  western  railway. 
As  the  road  ran  for  a  short  distance  through  the 
street  of  the  town  the  municipal  authorities  had 
refused  a  permit  for  change,  but  the  company 
had  begun,  nevertheless.  After  listening  to  im- 
passioned speechmaking  from  the  court-house 
steps  till  it  was  thoroughly  roused,  the  crowd, 
led  by  the  mayor,  started  for  the  wooden  railroad 
bridge.  They  found  it  guarded  by  employees 
of  the  railroad,  who  were  soon  scattered  by  a 
shower  of  rotten  eggs  and  other  missiles.  The 
mob  then  attacked  the  bridge,  tore  up  the  tracks 
and  the  timber,  and  returned  triumphantly  to  the 
city.  Two  days  later  a  similar  mob  tore  up 
the  track,  destroyed  the  bridge,  and  ploughed  the 
road  at  Harbor  Creek,  seven  miles  east  of  Erie. 
Mob-rule  had  come  in  earnest. 

It   was  two  months  before   a  single  train  got 


Coming  of  the  Railroad  to   Lake  Erie     297 

through  to  any  point  near  these  places,  and  it  was 
three  years  before  the  matter  was  finally  adjusted. 
The  courts  and  the  state  militia  became  involved. 
State  feeling  ran  high  between  Ohio,  Pennsyl- 
vania, and  New  York  over  the  question  of  their 
local  gauges,  and  the  press  of  the  whole  country 
took  sides  in  the  matter.  Passengers  and  freight 
had  to  be  transferred  during  the  winter  months, 
when  the  lake  was  closed,  by  wagon  from  the 
stop  east  of  Erie  to  the  stop  west  of  that  town,  a 
process  that  was  called  "  Crossing  the  Isthmus." 
But  still  the  Erie  people  rallied  with  the 
watchword,  "  Break  gauge  at  Erie,  or  have  no 
railroad." 

Horace  Greeley,  going  west  at  this  time,  had 
to  ride  the  seven  miles  across  the  "  Isthmus  "  in 
an  open  sleigh  through  a  severe  storm  of  wind, 
snow,  and  sleet,  and  after  that  the  railroad  man- 
agers and  the  townspeople  were  continually 
denounced  in  the  New  York  Tribune.  "  Let 
Erie  be  avoided  by  all  travellers,"  he  wrote  on 
his  return,  "  until  grass  shall  grow  in  her  streets, 
and  till  her  piemen  in  despair  shall  move  away  to 
some  other  city." 

Homes  of  railroad  officers  and  sympathizers 
were  mobbed  by  the  "  Rippers,"  as  the  opponents 


298          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

of  the  road  were  called  because  of  their  violent 
methods.  The  bridge  at  Harbor  Creek  was 
rebuilt  by  the  company  four  times,  only  to  have 
it  burned  or  torn  down.  At  last  when  the  whole 
town  was  split  into  bitter  factions  and  all  united 
local  spirit  was  for  the  time  being  destroyed,  the 
courts  and  legislature  settled  the  matter.  The 
railroad  company,  having  made  certain  conces- 
sions to  Erie  interests,  was  allowed  to  change  to 
a  compromise  gauge  of  four  feet  eight  and  a  half 
inches  (that  of  the  New  York  Central  road)  and 
run  trains  through  Erie  on  what  is  now  a  part  of 
the  Lake  Shore  and  Michigan  Southern  Railroad. 
The  great  era  of  consolidation  which  was  to  create 
our  transcontinental  lines  had  begun. 


CHAPTER   XXIII 

LINCOLN    AND    DOUGLAS    IN    CHICAGO 

IN  the  last  years  before  the  Civil  War,  Illinois 
became  a  political  storm  centre  to  which 
the  eyes  of  the  whole  nation  were  turned. 
Reaching  farther  south  than  any  other  lake  state, 
and  bounded  on  the  west  by  the  Mississippi 
River,  —  the  main  artery  of  trade  and  travel  of 
the  south,  —  she  was  bound  geographically  and 
commercially  to  the  south.  But  on  the  other 
hand  she  reached  north  to  Lake  Michigan,  a 
part  of  the  great  system  of  inland  waterways  of 
the  North.  More  than  any  other  state  she  pre- 
sented in  miniature  the  condition  of  the  nation, 
divided  thus  between  north  and  south.  More- 
over her  settlers,  moving  westward  along  the 
lines  of  latitude,  had  come  from  both  sections. 
With  a  southern  sentiment  in  those  counties  that 
were  nearest  to  Kentucky  and  Missouri,  she 
combined  in  her  upper  counties  men  from  New 
England,  New  York,  and  Pennsylvania  with  the 

299 


300         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

strongest  northern  principles.  Seeing  within  her 
own  bounds  the  elements  of  the  great  national 
conflict,  she  became  a  state  whose  strongest 
sentiment  was  for  union,  for  which  in  the  last 
analysis  all  her  best  political  leaders  stood. 

Into  this  state  came  Abraham  Lincoln  and 
Stephen  Arnold  Douglas  when  they  were  young 
men,  Lincoln  from  Kentucky  after  a  stay  in 
Indiana,  and  Douglas  from  Vermont  by  way  of 
New  York  State.  In  Illinois  these  two  men  \ 
fought  out  in  the  decade  before  the  Civil  War  / 
the  great  contest  of  the  two  national  parties  of 
the  time.  The  campaign  of  1858,  with  its 
famous  series  of  joint  debates  between  them,  was 
opened  in  Chicago  by  speeches  of  Douglas  and 
Lincoln  from  the  balcony  of  the  Tremont  House. 
In  Chicago  the  National  Republican  Convention 
nominated  Lincoln  for  President  on  the  i6th  of 
May,  1860.  To  a  royal  welcome  in  Chicago 
Douglas  returned  in  the  spring  of  1861  after  his 
noble  and  disinterested  support  of  his  elected 
rival  and  his  patriotic  efforts  for  the  preservation 
of  the  Union.  Here  within  a  few  weeks  he  died. 
Before  we  pass  to  the  story  of  these  events  in 
Chicago  we  must  learn  a  little  more  of  the  con- 
dition of  affairs  in  the  lake  states  during  the 


Lincoln  and  Douglas  in  Chicago        301 

interval  since  the  War  of  1812.  Of  the  growth  of  V 
their  cities  and  of  their  great  prosperity  we  shall 
speak  in  detail  in  later  chapters.  It  is  sufficient 
to  say  that  the  movement  of  population,  of  wealth, 
and  of  power  into  the  West  had  become  so  great 
that  the  Republicans  in  1860  considered  Chicago 
the  fitting  place  for  their  national  convention. 

Of  the  definite  problems  of  the  great  sectional 
contest,  the  lake  states  had  a  concrete  as  well  as  a 
theoretic  knowledge.  They  were  located  on  the 
northern  frontier  of  the  United  States,  and  they 
dipped  down  from  one  hundred  and  fifty  to  two 
hundred  and  sixty  miles  into  the  south.  Inevi- 
tably they  became  the  scene  of  fugitive  slave 
migration.  In  spite  of  the  strict  laws  of  the 
United  States  and  the  bitter  protests  of  the 
South,  the  escaped  slave  found  friends  when  he 
slipped  over  the  border  into  the  free  states,  and 
was  helped  by  them  into  Canada,  where  his  safety 
was  assured.  Since  1815  there  had  been  a  regu- 
larly organized  system  of  passing  these  runaways 
from  one  place  to  another  on  the  northern  route, 
a  system  which  so  baffled  and  mystified  the 
unsuccessful  masters  in  their  search  that  they  had 
given  it  the  name  of  the  "  Underground  Rail- 
road." The  route  through  Ohio  was  the  short- 


302          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

est  of  these  lines.  Only  a  little  more  than  two 
hundred  miles  lay  between  the  slave  states  south 
of  the  Ohio  River  and  freedom.  Along  the  river 
were  twenty-two  or  twenty-three  stations,  and 
every  port  on  Lake  Erie  was  a  point  of  depar- 
ture. The  five  principal  outlets  were  Toledo,  San- 
dusky,  Cleveland,  Ashtabula,  and  Fairport,  and 
through  these  stations  there  was  an  ever  increas- 
ing procession  of  fugitives.  Within  this  one 
state  it  has  been  calculated  that  there  were  nearly 
three  thousand  miles  of  "  underground  road." 
Western  Pennsylvania,  Indiana,  and  Illinois  had 
their  roads,  converging  at  Erie,  Detroit,  To- 
ledo, Michigan  City,  and  Chicago.  Such  was  the 
anti-slavery  sentiment  on  which  Lincoln  could  rely. 
A  hasty  sketch  of  the  lives  of  Lincoln  and 
Douglas  before  their  speeches  in  Chicago  in 
1858  will  show  the  typical  western  conditions 
which  had  put  them  in  their  leading  positions. 
Douglas  was  forty-five  years  old,  Lincoln  four  j 
years  older.  Born  in  Brandon,  Vermont,  Stephen 
Arnold  Douglas  was  the  son  of  a  young  physician, 
whose  father  was  Benajah  Douglass,1  a  New  York 
pioneer  who  had  moved  to  Vermont  and  there 
been  prominent  in  local  politics,  and  whose 

1  The  elder  Douglass  spelled  his  name  with  a  double  j. 


Lincoln  and  Douglas  in  Chicago        303 

mother  was  Martha  Arnold,  a  descendant  of 
Governor  William  Arnold  of  Rhode  Island. 
Dr.  Douglass  had  married  Sally  Fisk,  the 
daughter  of  a  prosperous  farmer.  He  died  when 
Stephen  was  very  young,  and  the  widow  and 
children  went  to  live  with  their  mother's  bachelor 
brother  on  the  Fisk  farm.  Here  Stephen  lived 
the  life  of  a  healthy  Vermont  boy  until  the 
marriage  of  his  uncle  and  the  birth  of  a  son 
changed  his  standing  in  the  family.  When  the 
boy  began  to  propose  going  to  Brandon  Academy 
to  prepare  for  college,  his  uncle  told  him  kindly 
that  he  could  not  provide  for  his  further  educa- 
tion. Stephen  in  a  fit  of  boyish  anger  left  the 
farm  and  apprenticed  himself  to  a  cabinet-maker 
in  Middlebury.  He  stayed  with  him  for  a  year, 
delighting  in  the  novelty  of  the  life  and  in  the 
companionship  with  a  group  of  young  men  with 
whom  he  could  discuss  politics  and  eulogize  his 
favorite  hero,  Andrew  Jackson  ;  but,  nevertheless, 
he  grew  weary  of  the  humble  position  of  appren- 
tice. After  two  years  with  this  man  and  with 
another  cabinet-maker,  he  gave  up  the  trade  and 
returned  to  the  home  of  his  mother,  enrolling 
himself  at  Brandon  Academy. 

The    marriage    of  his    sister  and  later  of  his 


304         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

mother  started  the  boy  at  the  age  of  seventeen 
on  his  westward  journeying.  It  put  him  into 
Canandaigua,  New  York,  where  he  pursued  his 
studies  at  its  excellent  academy  for  three  years, 
and  prepared  for  his  later  career  by  studying  law 
out  of  school  in  the  offices  of  local  attorneys. 
The  western  fever  was  upon  him,  and  life  on  one 
of  the  great  channels  of  westward  migration  in- 
duced him  in  the  spring  of  1833,  against  the 
wishes  of  his  relatives  and  friends,  to  start  for 
Buffalo  and  the  tempting  world  beyond. 

Douglas's  first  six  months  in  the  new  country 
were  marked  by  hardship  and  by  a  serious  illness. 
Lack  of  funds  drove  him  to  teaching  in  a  little 
Illinois  village  in  place  of  practising  law  as  he  had 
hoped.  Within  a  year,  however,  the  penniless 
boy  had  been  admitted  to  the  Illinois  bar,  by 
what  must  have  been  a  very  simple  examination, 
and  was  happily  established  in  a  law  office  in  the 
court-house  at  Jacksonville,  Illinois.  From 
this  time  on  law  was  subordinated  to  his  chosen 
pursuit,  politics,  for  which  his  ready  comradeship, 
his  acute  intelligence,  and  his  keen  ambition 
fitted  him  admirably.  He  filled  at  astonishingly 
early  ages  several  minor  positions,  working  his 
way  into  the  hearts  of  the  people  and  into  the 


Lincoln  and  Douglas  in  Chicago        305 

councils  of  the  Democratic  partyy  He  was  secre- 
tary of  state  for  Illinois  at  the  age  of  twenty-seven, 
and  in  that  year  was  also  made  a  district  judge. 
At  thirty  he  was  sent  as  a  member  of  Congress  to 
Washington.  Reflected  twice  he  was  promoted 
in  1847  to  tne  honor  of  senatorship,  and  became 
immediately  prominent  as  chairman  of  a  leading 
committee.  During  these  years  he  married  a 
southern  lady  and  removed  to  Chicago,  with 
whose  commercial  interests  he  allied  himself 
closely  by  investing  in  real  estate,  the  promise 
of  which  he  was  quick  to  see. 

To  Chicago  and  northern  Illinois  Douglas  ren- 
dered  a  great  service  by  contending  for  the  build-  i 
ing  of  the  Illinois  Central  Railroad  through  the 
upper  counties  of  the  state  to  Chicago  as  a  ter- 
minal. In  this  measure,  whose  passage  he  se- 
cured by  making  a  combination  plan  with  a 
southern  railroad  so  that  the  proposed  bill  con- 
templated in  the  future  a  trunk  line  from  the 
Great  Lakes  to  the  Gulf  of  Mexico  and  thus 
became  a  national  instead  of  a  local  measure, 
Senator  Douglas  showed  himself  more  than  a 
state  and  party  politician.  There  was  states- 
manlike genius  in  a  plan  thus  to  unite  the 
North  and  South  industrially  and  socially  at  a 


306          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

time  when  the  tendency  was  to  separate  interests 
and  separate  policies.  His  speech  in  Congress 
was  one  of  the  first  to  set  forth  the  power  of 
the  Great  Lakes  and  the  place  of  the  Mississippi 
Valley  in  the  national  well-being. 

Reflected  senator  for  several  successive  periods, 
he  became  through  the  Kansas-Nebraska  Bill, 
which  he  himself  drafted,  the  advocate  of  "  popu- 
lar sovereignty,"  a  phrase  which  he  coined  to 
take  the  place  of  the  less  dignified  term  "  squatter 
sovereignty,"  that  had  previously  designated  the 
principle  that  each  state  had  a  right  to  decide 
such  questions  as  slavery  for  itself.  He  returned 
to  Chicago  in  1854,  to  be  met  by  a  mob  who  de- 
nounced his  policy,  and  immediately  threw  him- 
self into  an  active  campaign  in  the  hostile  counties 
of  northern  Illinois.  When  he  came  back  to 
secure  his  seat  in  the  Senate  for  another  term, 
Douglas  had  been  placed  by  the  course  of  na- 
tional events  in  an  entirely  new  position.  Bitterly 
resenting  the  trickery  which  had  made  "  popular 
sovereignty "  a  mere  name  and  had  given  the 
state  of  Kansas  at  the  Lecompton  convention 
into  the  hands  of  the  pro-slavery  men,  Douglas 
stood  out  on  the  floor  of  the  Senate  against  his 
party  and  declared  his  opposition  to  the  Lecomp- 


Lincoln  and  Douglas  in   Chicago        307 

ton  constitution.  Revolting  against  his  own 
party,  he  was  nevertheless  representing  the  senti- 
ment of  Illinois  and  the  Northwest,  and  he  re- 
turned to  Chicago  in  1858  to  an  unequalled 
popularity. 

It  was  four  years  since  Douglas  had  been  in 
Chicago,  —  since  the  day  when  he  had  been  met 
by  a  storm  of  abuse  and  his  address  had  been 
heralded  by  the  lowering  of  flags  to  half-mast  and 
the  tolling  of  bells  as  for  some  public  calamity. 
Now  an  enthusiastic  delegation  met  him  at 
Michigan  City  and  escorted  him  by  special  train 
to  his  home.  As  his  train  entered  Chicago  it  was 
greeted  by  the  booming  of  cannon,  and  every  sign 
of  public  enthusiasm.  Crowds  filled  the  streets 
and  banners  waved  from  the  balconies  and 
windows.  The  whole  city  was  brilliantly  deco- 
rated ;  bands  of  music  marched  the  streets ;  and 
in  a  carriage  drawn  by  six  horses  and  surrounded 
by  a  military  escort  Senator  Douglas,  "  The  De- 
fender  of  Popular  Sovereignty,"  as  the  banners 
proclaimed  him,  drove  to  the  Tremont  House, 
receiving  everywhere  a  welcome  that  proclaimed 
him  the  idol  of  his  fellow-citizens. 

The  Tremont  House  was  the  finest  hotel  in 
the  city.  The  first  house  of  that  name  had  been 


308          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

built  in  1832.  It  had  been  burned,  as  had  its 
immediate  successor,  and  the  proprietor  had 
erected  on  the  land  a  fine  brick  building  five 
stories  and  a  half  high,  containing  two  hundred 
rooms,  whose  extravagant  cost  of  seventy  thou- 
sand dollars  and  whose  magnificence  the  business 
men  of  Chicago  had  been  inclined  to  ridicule  as 
entirely  beyond  the  possible  needs  of  the  city  at 
its  erection,  but  which  they  were  now  beginning 
to  regard  as  an  evidence  of  great  foresight  on  the 
part  of  its  builder.  From  its  balcony  Douglas 
delivered  on  the  night  of  his  arrival  the  first  ad- 
dress of  the  campaign  for  the  senatorship  in 
which,  by  the  nomination  of  the  Republicans, 
Abraham  Lincoln  was  to  be  his  opponent. 

While     Douglas    had    been    carrying    off  the    % 
honors  of  the  Democratic  party  of  Illinois,  Lin-     ^ 
coin  had  been  rising  more  slowly  to  prominence  / 
in  the  ranks  of  the  Whig  and  later  of  the  newly 
organized  Republican  party.     With  the  events  of 
his    early    life    his    subsequent    career    has   made 
every   one   familiar.     He   had   been  a  practising  *S 
lawyer   as   well    as    politician,    had    been    several 
times   to  the  state   legislature,  and  in   1846    had 
been  sent  to    Congress.     Opposing  the  Kansas- 
Nebraska  Act,  he  had  done  much  to  organize  the 


Lincoln  and  Douglas  in  Chicago        309 

new  Republican  party  in  Illinois,  and  was  recog- 
nized as  its  strongest  man.  He  was  now  unani- 
mously named  as  "  the  first  and  only  choice  of  the 
Republicans  of  Illinois  for  the  United  States 
Senate."  Yet,  although  known  to  the  Republi- 
cans of  the  Northwest  as  a  lawyer  of  ability  and 
a  political  leader,  he  seemed  no  match  for  the 
popular  and  well-known  senator  from  Washing- 
ton. 

With  Lincoln  standing  behind  him  within  the 
hotel,  Douglas  made  on  the  evening  of  the  9th 
of  July  a  long  address  to  the  thousands  of  people 
who  surged  in  the  street  below  the  balcony. 
This  speech  was  a  defence  of  his  Lecompton 
attitude,  and  a  review  of  his  differences  with  Lin- 
coln's propositions,  as  expressed  in  his  speech 
accepting  the  nomination,  the  famous  "  house- 
divided-against-itself "  declaration.  Douglas  was 
a  short,  broad-shouldered,  thick-set  man,  with 
great  alertness  and  animation  of  manner.  A 
traveller  from  the  East  who  was  staying  at  the 
hotel  recorded  her  impressions  of  the  two 
speakers.  Of  Douglas,  she  said  that  in  manner 
he  combined  force  and  unusual  grace.  His  head 
was  noble,  almost  Websterian,  his  voice  pleasant, 
and  altogether  he  was  "  a  most  effective  popular 


310         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

speaker."  The  next  night  Lincoln  spoke  to  a 
large  and  enthusiastic  audience  from  the  same 
balcony.  Because  he  was  not  so  well-known  the 
writer  described  him  more  fully.  In  person  tall 
and  awkward,  and  in  manner  ungainly,  his  face 
still  had  such  good  humor,  generosity,  and  intel- 
lect beaming  from  it  that  it  made  the  eye  love  to 
linger  there  until  one  almost  fancied  him  good- 
looking.  As  a  political  speaker  she  found  him 
ready,  humorous,  and  argumentative,  with  a  gift 
at  telling  anecdotes  with  inconceivable  quaintness 
and  effect. 

The  two  candidates  had  met  many  times  be- 
fore, and  had  debated  together  as  early  as  1834. 
Lincoln  was  not  underrated  by  Douglas  as  a 
weak  opponent  in  the  campaign.  When  Doug- 
las heard  of  his  nomination  he  had  said,  "  I  shall 
have  my  hands  full.  He  is  the  strong  man  of 
his  party  —  full  of  wit,  facts,  dates  —  and  the 
best  stump  speaker,  with  his  droll  ways  and  dry 
jokes,  in  the  West.  He  is  as  honest  as  he  is 
shrewd ;  and  if  I  beat  him,  my  victory  will  be 
hardly  won." 

Immediately  after  the  Chicago  speeches  the 
two  candidates  set  out  on  the  tour  of  Illinois 
which  soon  became  a  three  months'  continuation 


Lincoln  and  Douglas  in  Chicago        311 

of  joint  debates.  As  a  result  Douglas  went  back 
to  the  Senate,  but  he  went  back  a  weakened  man 
to  a  divided  party.  Two  years  later,  while  he  was 
being  nominated  for  the  presidency  by  one  wing 
of  his  party,  Lincoln  was  being  nominated  for  the 
same  office  by  the  Republicans  at  Chicago. 

When  it  was  decided  to  hold  the  National 
Republican  Convention  in  that  city,  the  people 
set  about  providing  a  building  for  the  occasion. 
At  Pittsburg  in  1856  a  hall  for  two  thousand  was 
large  enough.  At  the  corner  of  Lake  and  Mar-  \ 
ket  streets  the  Republicans  erected  a  huge  oblong  f 
wooden  building  which  would  hold  ten  thousand 
men,  and  as  the  event  proved  it  was  not  large 
enough  by  a  third,  and  twenty  thousand  more 
clamored  in  the  streets  for  admittance.  This 
structure  was  absolutely  bare,  its  walls  being 
broken  by  two  rows  of  windows,  and  its  two 
front  corners  surmounted  by  small  square  towers 
with  flagstaff's.  Over  the  door  was  an  arched 
front  bearing  the  words  "  Republican  Wigwam/' 
It  cost  seven  thousand  dollars  and  its  great  vir- 
tue was  the  excellence  of  its  acoustic  properties. 

Thousands  of  men  came  to  the  city  for  the 
convention  and  the  excitement  was  tremendous. 
During  the  first  two  days  of  the  gathering  the 


312          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

time  was  given  up  to  framing  the  platform  and 
to  other  business,  and  it  was  not  till  the  third  day 
that  the  four  hundred  and  sixty-five  delegates 
proceeded  to  balloting.  The  New  Yorkers  were 
jubilant  in  their  assurance  of  the  success  of  their 
nominee,  Mr.  Seward,  and  had  created  the  same 
impression  in  many  circles.  As  a  last  demon- 
stration the  Seward  men  held  a  great  parade  on 
the  morning  of  the  third  day,  the  i8th  of 
May ;  but  by  this  act  they  lost  more  than  they 
gained,  for  while  they  were  marching  about  with 
bands  the  Lincoln  men  filled  up  the  Wigwam, 
and  when  the  Seward  men  arrived  they  had  to  take 
back  seats. 

When  the  convention  was  called  to  order,  there 
was  not  an  unoccupied  space  a  foot  square  in 
the  building.  The  three  broad  doorways  were 
crowded,  and  outside  tens  of  thousands  of  men 
thronged  the  streets.  The  excitement  was  tre- 
mendous, and  thunders  of  applause  burst  forth 
at  the  names  of  Seward  and  Lincoln.  When 
the  delegates  settled  down  to  voting,  the  result 
of  the  first  ballot  was  173^-  for  Seward  and  102 
for  Lincoln,  the  rest  of  the  votes  going  to  the  six 
minor  candidates.  On  the  next  ballot  the  states 
abandoned  their  "  favorite  sons,"  turning  to  one 


Lincoln  and  Douglas  in  Chicago        313 

or  the  other  of  the  two  leaders,  with  the  result 
that  Seward  had  184^  and  Lincoln  181.  Two 
hundred  and  thirty-three  votes  were  necessary  for 
a  choice.  As  the  delegates  were  preparing  for 
the  third  ballot,  the  chairman  of  the  Illinois  Re- 
publican Committee  entered  the  hall  with  a  large 
crayon  likeness  of  "  Honest  Old  Abe,"  while 
Judge  Davis  followed,  carrying  on  his  shoulders 
a  long,  moss-covered  old  rail  bearing  the  legend, 
"  Split  by  Lincoln."  The  dense  crowd  went 
wild  with  enthusiasm. 

On  the  third  ballot  Lincoln  had  23  ij,  Seward 
1 80.  One  vote  and  a  half  more  were  needed,  and 
there  was  a  moment  of  breathless  silence  until 
the  chairman  of  the  Ohio  delegation  rose  and 
announced  the  change  of  four  votes  from  Chase 
to  Lincoln.  For  a  moment  the  hall  was  still, 
and  then  as  every  one  drew  a  long  breath  of 
relief  the  sound  in  the  Wigwam  was  like  the  rush 
of  a  mighty  wind.  Then  the  thunders  of  ap- 
plause and  the  shouting  broke  loose.  The  man 
on  the  roof  who  had  been  reporting  the  balloting 
to  the  crowds  without  leaned  over  the  skylight 
to  find  out  who  had  been  the  man  named.  One 
of  the  tellers  shouted  above  the  din,  "  Fire  the 
salute  !  Abe  Lincoln  is  nominated  !  "  and  outside 


314         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

the  waiting  thousands  took  up  the  cry.  So  loud 
was  the  uproar  that  men  in  the  Wigwam  could 
hardly  hear  the  sound  of  the  cannon  discharged 
on  the  roof  of  the  building,  or  the  answering 
salute  of  one  hundred  guns  fired  from  the  roof 
of  the  Tremont  House.  Votes  were  promptly 
changed  over  until  the  number  for  Lincoln  was 
three  hundred  and  fifty-four,  and  then  the  con- 
vention adjourned.  It  had  been  one  of  the 
memorable  conventions  of  the  nation,  and  had 
been  made  up  of  a  large  number  of  leading  men. 
Sixty  of  the  delegates  were  later  sent  by  their 
respective  states  to  Congress,  and  many  of  the 
members  were  made  governors.  A  great  man 
had  been  called  to  lead  the  nation  through  a 
great  crisis. 

One  more  memorable  scene  in  the  lives  of 
these  two  men  took  place  at  the  Wigwam,  which 
had  been  rechristened  National  Hall.  To  Chi- 
cago Douglas  returned  after  war  had  been  de- 
clared. With  rare  nobility  and  greatness  he  had 
supported  President  Lincoln  and  the  administra- 
tion in  Washington,  upholding  Lincoln  in  every 
way  that  the  leader  of  a  great  party,  who  had 
polled  at  the  last  election  over  a  million  votes, 
could.  No  leader  has  ever  shown  less  personal 


Lincoln  and  Douglas  in  Chicago        315 

feeling  and  more  true  greatness  than  Mr.  Douglas 
in  that  crisis.  He  sank  the  partisan  in  the  patriot 
and  turned  all  his  energies  towards  the  saving  of 
the  Union.  With  Lincoln's  approval  and  grati- 
tude he  left  Washington  to  arouse  the  sentiment 
of  loyalty  and  Unionism  in  the  critical  North- 
west, and  made  in  April,  1861,  a  series  of  ad- 
dresses along  his  homeward  route,  closing  with 
a  great  plea  in  the  Capitol  at  Springfield.  One 
who  had  never  admired  him,  listening  now  to 
this  speech  for  the  support  of  the  government 
and  the  defence  of  the  Union,  said  that  he  did 
not  think  it  was  possible  for  a  human  being  to 
produce  a  more  prodigious  effect  with  spoken 
words.  Southern  as  well  as  northern  Illinois 
was  ready  after  this  for  the  conflict. 

As  he  entered  Chicago  Douglas  was  met  with 
a  remarkable  demonstration.  He  had  come  home 
many  times,  sometimes  for  honor  and  some- 
times for  abuse,  but  never  to  meet  the  united 
regard  and  support  of  men  of  all  parties  and  all 
beliefs.  In  the  Wigwam  he  made  a  final  ad- 
dress, setting  forth  to  his  hearers  the  situation, 
and  announcing  that  the  critical  time  was  come. 
"  The  conspiracy  is  now  known.  .  .  .  There 
are  only  two  sides  to  the  question.  Every  man 


316          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

must  be  for  the  United  States  or  against  it." 
For  the  first  time  he  drew  the  sharp  distinction 
setting  the  two  sides  in  striking  contrast,  and 
calling  the  people  of  Illinois  to  loyalty.  The 
gentle  side  of  his  personality  made  him  foresee 
with  dread  the  horrors  of  war,  and  he  besought 
the  people  to  remember  that  they  were  a  Chris- 
tian nation  and  as  such  they  must  prosecute  the 
war,  saving  as  far  as  possible  the  innocent,  the 
women  and  children,  from  suffering. 

The  Chicago  speech  was  published  all  over 
the  country,  and  Douglas  supporters  recognized 
that  their  leader  had  become  the  first  of  the 
great  company  of  "  War  Democrats,"  of  which 
General  Logan  and  other  distinguished  men 
were  to  be  loyal  members.  In  a  few  days  he 
was  taken  ill  and  died  at  the  Tremont  House. 
His  last  words  were  a  message  to  his  sons  to 
"  obey  the  laws  and  support  the  Constitution 
of  the  United  States."  Chicago,  Illinois,  and 
the  nation  mourned  him  as  a  true  patriot. 


Copyright,  I'.XIo,  by  Detroit  Publishing  <_'( 

THE   OLD  AND  THE   NEW 
General  Cass's  Canoe  and  a  Modern  Freight  Steamer 


CHAPTER   XXIV 

THE    GREAT    LAKES    IN    THE    CIVIL    WAR 

AS  the  northern  frontier  of  the  United 
States  the  Great  Lakes,  although  at  some 
distance  from  the  decisive  battles  of  the 
Civil  War,  were  the  scene  of  strong  Confederate 
activity,  especially  in  the  last  year  of  the  struggle. 
In  April,  1864,  Jefferson  Davis  sent  three  men 
to  Canada  as  "  Special  Commissioners  of  the 
Confederate  Government."  They  established 
quarters  at  Montreal  and  Toronto,  and  prepared 
themselves  according  to  their  written  and  verbal 
instructions  to  use  in  any  way  possible  the  feeling 
of  hostility  to  the  administration,  which  existed 
in  the  Northwestern  states,  and  to  organize  this 
sentiment  into  definite  opposition  to  the  further 
prosecution  of  the  war.  That  was  where  they 
began.  The  most  daring  Confederate  leaders  in 
Canada  and  the  South  had  dreams  of  a  North- 
western Confederacy  which  should  come  into 
being  after  a  general  uprising  and  should  be 

317 


318          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

matched  by  the  Southern  Confederacy  and  an 
Eastern  Union.  There  were  at  this  time  prob- 
ably one  hundred  escaped  Confederate  prisoners 
in  Canada,  as  well  as  many  Southern  men  and 
Confederate  sympathizers  who  had  come  there 
when,  for  some  reason,  they  were  better  able  to 
serve  their  cause  at  this  distance. 

Talk  with  Northern  men  who  visited  Canada 
disclosed  to  the  commissioners  the  fact  that  there 
was  in  all  the  lake  states  a  large  body  of  dis- 
affected men  who  did  not  support  the  adminis- 
tration. These  were  divided  into  two  classes : 
first,  the  members  of  secret  societies  of  a  political 
and  semi-military  nature,  of  which  the  "  Sons  of 
Liberty "  was  the  leading  organization ;  and 
secondly,  a  large  number  who  were  actuated 
mainly  by  a  general  weariness  and  dissatisfaction 
with  the  war.  Especially  in  Ohio,  Indiana,  and 
Illinois  the  "  Sons  of  Liberty  "  had  great  strength. 
It  is  difficult  to  find  out  the  exact  figures.  In 
the  three  states  it  is  thought  they  may  have  had 
one  hundred  and  seventy -five  thousand  members. 
Chicago  had  a  strong  chapter  of  two  thousand 
men,  which  was  constantly  adding  to  its  numbers. 
The  latter  class,  of  those  who  were  generally  dis- 
affected with  the  situation,  was  strengthened  by 


The  Great  Lakes  in  the  Civil  War      319 

Mr.  Lincoln's  call  in  July  of  1864  for  five  hundred 
thousand  more  men  for  the  army.  Indeed,  it  was 
along  this  line  that  the  secret  societies  did  most 
harm.  When  the  time  for  definite  action  came, 
these  men  were  not  ready  to  strike  a  blow  against 
the  Union ;  but  the  sentiment  of  the  bodies  was 
against  volunteering,  and  by  reducing  the  num- 
bers of  ready  volunteers  they  made  drafting,  with 
its  attendant  discontent,  necessary  in  these  last 
years,  after  these  same  states  had  sent  out  so 
many  regiments  of  their  best  sons  to  serve  gal- 
lantly on  the  field. 

The  first  project  of  the  Confederates  on  the 
Canadian  frontier  was  to  liberate  all  Confederate 
prisoners  in  the  North,  and  in  this  purpose  their 
hopes  centred  in  Chicago,  for  here  there  was  a 
great  prison  with  thousands  of  men  in  confine- 
ment. Camp  Douglas  had  been  laid  out  in  the 
summer  of  1861  as  a  camp  for  military  instruc- 
tion. It  was  located  on  land  belonging  to  the  \ 
Douglas  estate,  just  north  of  the  grounds  of  the  / 
first  Chicago  University.  In  this  region,  where 
stands  to-day  the  Douglas  monument,  no  streets 
were  then  laid  out,  but  the  whole  was  open 
prairie,  save  for  the  little  University  building 
erected  four  years  before,  and  one  solitary  resi- 


320         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

dence.  The  eamp  was  first  used  as  a  military 
station,  but  in  February,  1862,  after  the  battle  of 
Fort  Donelson,  it  was  hastily  prepared  for  the 
reception  of  prisoners  and  eight  or  nine  thou- 
sand Confederates  were  placed  there.  Temporary 
quarters  were  erected  to  hold  them,  but  the 
barracks  became  so  crowded  that  the  United 
States  regiments  were  obliged  to  encamp  in  tents 
on  the  prairie.  During  this  year  Camp  Douglas 
served  as  military  prison  for  seventeen  thousand 
Confederate  prisoners  and  furnished  barracks  as 
well  for  eight  thousand  paroled  Confederate 
troops.  In  1863  it  was  much  improved  by  a 
thorough  rebuilding  which  followed  a  season  of 
inclement  weather,  when  the  unsanitary  and 
crowded  conditions  made  the  men,  already  weak- 
ened by  exposure  and  army  life,  a  prey  to  all 
kinds  of  disease.  It  was  in  the  fall  of  this  year 
that  many  dramatic  escapes  were  made,  the  pris- 
oners taking  up  the  floor  of  their  barracks  and 
digging  gradually  at  night  and  during  the  absences 
of  the  guards  a  long  tunnel  large  enough  for  one 
man  to  crawl  through  to  the  open  land  beyond 
the  camp  fence.  On  a  dark  night  eight  or  ten 
men  would  make  their  way  out,  watching  from 
the  outer  end  of  the  tunnel  to  escape  between  the 


The  Great  Lakes  in  the  Civil  War       321 

rounds  of  the  sentinel.  During  November  some 
seventy  prisoners  made  their  escape  through  a 
tunnel  over  fifty  feet  long,  of  whom  fifty  were 
afterwards  recaptured.  The  next  year  the  pris- 
oners' barracks  were  raised  four  feet  above  the 
ground  to  prevent  such  escapes. 

It  was  no  wonder  that  the  thoughts  of  the 
Canadian  Commissioners  turned  to  this  prison. 
During  the  year  1864,  seventy-five  hundred  men 
came  to  join  the  five  thousand  already  there,  and 
in  spite  of  the  large  death-rate  that  summer  from 
smallpox  and  other  contagious  diseases,  this  was  a 
body  of  men  who,  if  liberated,  could  do  great 
things  in  the  Northwest. 

All  summer  the  leaders  of  the  movement  tried 
to  get  their  Northern  sympathizers  to  move,  but 
the  "  Sons  of  Liberty  "  set  as  the  first  possible 
time  for  action  the  29th  of  August,  the  date  of 
the  meeting  of  the  National  Democratic  Conven- 
tion in  Chicago.  At  this  time,  and  under  the 
guise  of  politics,  large  numbers  of  men  could  be 
introduced  into  the  city  without  suspicion  and 
it  was  hoped  that  the  sentiment  of  the  convention 
would  be  one  of  strong  disaffection  to  further 
prosecution  of  the  war.  Captain  Hines,  one  of 
the  leading  agents  of  the  Confederacy,  and  sixty 


322          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

picked  men  were  ready  to  head  the  movement ; 
arms  had  been  brought  into  the  city,  and  the 
prisoners  had  been  notified  to  be  ready ;  but  the 
rank  and  file  of  the  prospective  army  did  not 
materialize.  The  government  had  got  wind  of 
the  project  and  had  sent  extra  troops  to  the  city. 
These  amounted  to  only  a  thousand  men,  but  the 
convention  was  not  so  rabid  in  its  opposition  as 
had  been  hoped,  and  when  it  came  to  the  moment 
the  "  Sons  of  Liberty  "  were  not  ready  to  strike 
the  decisive  blow,  and  the  leaders  were  soon  con- 
vinced that  the  time  was  not  ripe.  They  could 
not  count  on  a  sufficiently  large  number  of  North- 
western men  for  their  support,  and  without  them 
they  could  do  nothing. 

The  next  step  in  the  programme  of  the  disap- 
pointed Commissioners  was  to  capture  the  war 
steamer  Michigan,  the  only  armed  vessel  on 
the  lakes,  which  was  now  at  Sandusky,  and  to 
release  the  Confederate  prisoners  on  Johnson's 
Island  within  that  inlet.  The  Camp  Douglas 
scheme  had  been  to  march  southward  through 
Illinois  to  the  support  of  the  Southern  army. 
The  present  plan  was  to  go  by  steamer  from 
Sandusky  to  Cleveland,  capture  that  city,  and 
proceed  through  Ohio  to  Virginia.  The  plot 


The  Great  Lakes  in  the  Civil  War       323 

was  worked  out  to  its  last  detail.  Every  signal 
was  arranged.  There  were  conspirators  in  the 
city  and  on  the  island,  and  even  on  the  gun- 
boat itself.  But  the  plan  was  disclosed  by  a  spy 
to  the  lieutenant-colonel  at  Detroit,  who  tele- 
graphed an  instant  warning  to  the  commander  of 
the  Michigan,  and  Cole,  the  leader  in  this  part  of 
the  plan,  was  taken.  Mr.  Beall,  who  was  to  bring 
men  from  Canada,  received  no  word  of  this  mis- 
adventure, but  proceeded  to  execute  his  share  of 
the  scheme.  To  disarm  suspicion  the  first  of  his 
party,  a  Mr.  Burley,  took  passage  on  the  steamer 
Philo  Parsons,  a  merchant  vessel  plying  be- 
tween Detroit  and  Sandusky.  Mr.  Beall  and  two 
others  embarked  at  Sandwich  on  the  Canadian 
side  of  the  river,  and  sixteen  men  came  on  at 
Amherstburg.  This  last  party  embarked  in  worn 
and  ragged  garments,  passing  as  tramps  who  had 
gone  to  Canada  to  better  their  fortunes,  but  with- 
out success.  Their  only  baggage  was  one  great 
old-fashioned  trunk  tied  with  ropes.  After  the 
steamer  left  Kelley's  Island,  outside  Sandusky 
Bay,  Beall  announced  to  the  mate  in  a  loud 
voice  that  he  hereby  took  possession  of  the  boat 
in  the  name  of  the  Confederate  States.  As  he 
spoke  his  followers  opened  the  trunk  and  pulled 


324         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

out  a  formidable  array  of  revolvers  and  hatchets 
which  they  brandished  about.  The  crew  and  pas- 
sengers had  no  choice  but  to  surrender.  As  the 
boat  needed  fuel  Beall  had  it  put  about  and  headed 
for  Middle  Bass  Island,  ten  miles  from  the  Ohio 
shore  and  about  the  same  distance  from  Johnson's 
Island.  Here  the  passengers  were  set  on  shore 
and  another  steamer,  the  Island  £>ueeny  was 
boarded  as  she  came  up  to  make  her  usual  landing, 
and  taken  possession  of  with  much  uproar  and 
some  shooting.  Her  passengers  were  also  landed 
after  a  time  of  suspense  on  their  part,  and  she  was 
towed  out  into  the  lake,  scuttled,  and  set  adrift 
to  sink  where  she  might. 

Beall  again  headed  the  Philo  Parsons  for 
Sandusky  Bay  and  the  gunboat  Michigan,  but 
when  he  reached  the  inlet  there  was  no  sign  of 
the  signal  lights  and  rockets  which  were  to  have 
guided  him.  It  was  bright  moonlight,  and  the 
conspirators  could  see  the  lights  on  the  gunboat, 
and  even  the  outlines  of  her  dark  hulk,  but  all 
was  quiet  and  peaceful.  Then  seventeen  of 
Beall's  men  declared  that  they  would  go  no 
farther.  No  one  of  the  expected  signals  had 
been  shown  ;  Cole  had  evidently  failed,  and  they 
did  not  mean  to  rush  blindly  into  battle  with  a 


The  Great  Lakes  in  the  Civil  War       325 

gunboat  already  warned  of  their  approach.  The 
steamer  was  brought  to  a  stop  and  Beall  and  his 
assistant,  Burley,  urged  the  men  on,  but  in  vain. 
The  seventeen  men  drew  up  and  signed  a  formal 
protest,  in  which  they  stated  that  they  as  a  crew 
would  here  express  their  admiration  of  John  Beall, 
both  as  captain  and  military  leader,  but  being  con- 
vinced that  the  enemy  was  already  apprised  of 
their  approach  and  so  well  prepared  that  their 
attack  could  not  possibly  succeed,  and  having  al- 
ready captured  two  boats,  they  declined  to  prose- 
cute the  enterprise  further.  Beall  and  his  two 
supporters  had  no  alternative  but  to  head  about 
for  the  Detroit  River.  He  landed  several  pris- 
oners on  an  island  in  the  river,  among  them  the 
captain  of  the  Island  ghteen,  and  then  went 
on  to  Sandwich  on  the  Canadian  shore.  He  and 
his  men  removed  everything  of  value  from  the 
Philo  Parsons,  bored  holes  in  her  keel  and 
sides,  and  left  her  to  sink,  while  they  made  their 
escape  into  the  interior. 

This  bold  attempt  caused  great  excitement  on 
the  northern  borders  of  the  United  States  and  in 
Canada.  The  British  government  redoubled  its 
watchfulness,  and  the  United  States  sent  detec- 
tives across  the  lakes  to  keep  a  close  lookout  on 


326          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

the  Canadian  ports.  So  successful  was  this  care 
that  the  next  expedition  planned  by  Beall  within 
a  few  weeks  failed  utterly.  He  was  to  start  with 
a  vessel  from  Canada,  capture  the  American 
steamers  in  Buffalo  harbor,  take  the  city  if  pos- 
sible, and  then  proceed  to  Cleveland  and  to  the 
prisoners  at  Johnson's  Island.  The  Confederates 
were  so  closely  watched  that  they  could  not  even 
get  arms  or  supplies  on  the  boat. 

September  had  seen  these  two  attempts  on  the 
lakes.  The  next  step  was  the  famous  St.  Al- 
bans  raid,  when  Confederates  descended  from  Can- 
ada into  Vermont,  and  in  a  half  hour  tried  to 
fire  the  town,  robbed  the  banks,  shot  at  the  citi- 
zens, and  were  gone  again,  leaving  consternation 
in  their  wake.  The  whole  frontier  was  aroused 
by  this  time.  The  citizens  of  the  lakes  became 
alarmed  for  their  business  and  commerce,  fearing 
that  such  attempts  would  paralyze  trade.  The 
convention  of  1817  with  Great  Britain  had  lim- 
ited the  naval  force  on  the  lakes  of  each  of  the 
two  nations  to  three  armed  vessels,  neither  fleet 
to  be  increased  without  six  months'  notice  to 
the  other  power.  On  October  24,  four  days 
after  the  St.  Albans  raid,  the  British  were  noti- 
fied that  the  United  States  would  now  deem 


The  Great  Lakes  in  the  Civil  War       327 

themselves  at  liberty  to  increase  the  armament 
within  six  months  if  in  their  judgment  the  condi- 
tion of  affairs  should  require  it.  Congress  in  De- 
cember authorized  the  construction  of  six  revenue 
cutters  on  the  lakes,  but  the  war  was  fortunately 
drawing  to  a  close  and  no  further  action  was  taken. 
The  Canadian  officials  made  up  their  minds 
that  there  should  be  no  more  open  raids  to  cast 
reproach  on  the  neutrality  of  their  government, 
but  the  Confederates  were  becoming  more  des- 
perate as  the  end  of  the  struggle  drew  near. 
They  had  not  given  up  their  hopes  in  Chicago, 
but  now  set  the  night  of  election  day,  Novem- 
ber 8,  for  an  attempt  on  Camp  Douglas.  The  plan 
of  the  leaders,  as  they  afterwards  confessed, 
was  to  attack  Camp  Douglas,  releasing  the  pris- 
oners, to  seize  the  polls,  and  stuff  the  boxes  until 
the  city,  county,  and  state  were  for  McLellan, 
the  Democratic  candidate,  and  finally  to  "  utterly 
sack  the  city,  burning  and  destroying  every  de- 
scription of  property,  except  what  they  could 
appropriate  for  their  own  use  and  that  of  their 
Southern  brethren  —  to  lay  the  city  waste  and 
carry  off  its  money  and  stores  to  Jefferson 
Davis's  dominions."  Colonel  Sweet,  command- 
ing at  Chicago,  was  warned  of  this  plan  by 


328          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

United  States  detectives  so  early  that  he  was  able 
to  break  up  the  conspiracy  without  open  blood- 
shed. When,  on  November  6,  the  city  began  to 
fill  up  with  suspicious  characters,  especially  the 
leaders  of  the  August  gathering,  and  it  became 
evident  that  the  Confederate  sympathizers  would 
soon  outnumber  the  small  garrison  at  Camp 
Douglas,  Colonel  Sweet  caused  the  arrest  of 
Colonel  St.  Leger  Grenfell  and  fourteen  other 
Confederate  officers,  and  also  the  heads  of  the 
"Sons  of  Liberty."  This  completely  broke  up 
the  conspiracy. 

Two  more  attempts  were  made  by  the  Confed- 
erates from  Canada,  one  to  burn  New  York  City, 
and  the  other  to  wreck  trains  on  the  lake  roads. 
The  Confederate  Commissioner,  Thompson,  re- 
ceived word  in  December  that  seven  Southern 
generals  were  to  be  moved  from  Johnson's  Island 
to  Fort  Lafayette,  New  York.  He  detailed 
Beall  and  ten  others  to  take  the  train  and  release 
them.  They  were  to  stop  the  train  at  a  lonely 
place  between  Sandusky  and  Buffalo  by  put- 
ting rails  across  the  track,  and  to  secure  the  engi- 
neer and  conductor.  While  Beall  and  a  few  men 
went  to  secure  the  money  in  the  express  safe  of 
the  train,  others  were  to  arm  the  generals  and 


The  Great  Lakes  in  the  Civil  War       329 

intimidate  the  passengers.  The  coaches  were  to 
be  detached,  the  engine  derailed,  and  then  the 
Confederates  were  to  take  such  money  as  they 
would  need,  get  into  sleighs,  and  scatter  over 
Ohio  and  Pennsylvania,  while  the  leaders  drove 
to  Buffalo  and  caught  the  train  to  Canada.  The 
detectives  discovered  their  plans,  and  Beall  and 
his  companion  were  arrested  while  they  were  asleep 
in  an  eating-room  near  the  place  of  the  proposed 
attack.  When  the  others  failed  to  find  their 
leader,  they  hastened  to  escape  to  Canada. 

Beall  was  tried  for  this  and  other  similar  deeds, 
and  for  his  capture  of  the  Philo  Parsons  and  the 
Island  Queen,  and  sentenced  to  be  hanged  for  his 
conduct  as  a  spy  and  for  carrying  on  irregular 
and  guerilla  warfare  against  the  United  States. 
The  Camp  Douglas  leaders  were  also  tried  by 
military  courts.  St.  Leger  Grenfell  was  sentenced 
to  death,  but  this  was  commuted  to  imprisonment 
for  life  in  Florida,  from  which  he  escaped  three 
years  later.  The  other  leaders  received  sentences 
of  imprisonment  for  terms  of  two,  three,  and  five 
years.  Camp  Douglas  had  in  1865  nearly  twelve 
thousand  men  in  its  barracks,  but  at  the  close  of 
the  war  these  were  gradually  sent  to  their  homes, 
the  property  was  sold,  and  the  buildings  torn  down. 


CHAPTER   XXV 

THREE    GREAT    INDUSTRIES    OF    THE    LAKES 

NO  part  of  the  story  of  the  Great  Lakes  is 
more  significant  than  the  tale  of  the 
building  up  of  the  large  enterprises 
that  have  made  that  region  one  of  the  leading 
centres  of  production  and  consumption  in  the 
United  States  and  the  world.  The  heroes  of 
exploration  and  of  adventure  were  the  forerun- 
ners of  commerce,  and  the  founders  of  cities 
were  the  leaders  of  industry.  Two  of  the  three 
great  industries  of  the  early  days  have  persisted 
to  the  present  time ;  all  three  of  them  have 
contributed  largely  to  exploration  and  occu- 
pation and  deserve  to  be  treated  somewhat  in 
detail. 

Washington  Irving  has  well  said  that  two  lead- 
ing objects  of  commercial  gain  have  given  birth  to 
wide  and  daring  enterprise  in  the  early  history 
of  America.  The  precious  metals  led  the  Span- 

330 


Three  Great  Industries  of  the  Lakes       331 

iard  to  Mexico  and  Peru,  while,  as  he  puts  it, 
the  "  adroit  and  buoyant  Frenchman "  and  the 
"  cool  and  calculating  Briton  "  pursued  the  cc  less 
splendid,  but  no  less  lucrative  traffic  in  the 
rich  peltries  of  the  north."  The  pioneer  fur 
traders  were  followed  only  after  many,  many 
years,  by  what  Irving  has  characterized  as  cc  the 
slow  and  pausing  steps  of  agriculture." 

Apart  from  the  land  which  agriculture  might 
in  times  of  settled  peace  make  profitable,  the 
white  man  found  three  great  natural ^ources  of 
wealth.  These  were  anjjnals-J^e^ririg  fur  of  great 
value,  enormous  deposits  of  copper  and  iron, 
and  primeval  forests  filled  with  trees  suited  to 
the  uses  of  civilized  man.  Profits  from  these 
financed  many  an  enterprise,  from  the  earliest 
voyages  and  the  building  of  the  Griffon  to  the 
days  of  the  railroad  and  the  "  Soo  "  Canal.  For 
two  centuries,  from  1634  to  1834,  the  fur  trade 
was  the  leading  interest  and  source  of  profit  of 
the  Great  Lakes. 

During  Champlain's  governorship  the  French, 
through  Nicolet,  first  opened  an  active  system 
of  trade  and  barter  wltrT  the  Incfians  of  theTakes, 
and  the  history  of  French  control  thereafter  is 
the  history  of  the  fur  trade.  It  paid  the  bills 


332          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

of  many  of  the  voyages  we  have  chronicled.  In 
1660  Radisson  and  Groseillers  returned  to  Que- 
bec from  their  Lake  Superior  voyage  with  sixty 
canoes  loaded  with  furs  valued  at  two  hundred 
thousand  pounds,  in  return  for  which  they  had 
distributed  among  the  Indians  kettles,  graters, 
awls,  needles,  tin  looking-glasses,  ivory  combs, 
and  knives.  Even  the  official  expedition  of 
Saint  Lusson  to  take  possession  of  the  North- 
west for  France  was  to  be  paid  for  by  gifts  to 
the  Indians  and  return  offerings  of  fur. 

The  fur  trade  of  the  Great  Lakes  supported 
not  only  those  who  took  up  their  dwelling  on 
these  shores,  but  the  struggling  settlements  of 
Canada  as  well.  It  kept  up  home  interest  in 
the  support  of  these  colonies  by  the  rich  profit 
that  it  brought  across  the  seas.  In  1703  La 
Hontan  wrote  that  Canada  subsisted  only  on 
the  trade  of  skins  and  furs.  The  profits  and 
the  fascination  of  this  pursuit  robbed  Canada 
of  its  young  men  while  it  supplied  it  with  money. 
An  official  reported,  in  1680,  that  eight  hundred 
men  out  of  a  population  of  ten  thousand  had 
vanished  from  sight  into  the  wilderness,  and 
that  there  was  not  a  family  of  any  condition  or 
quality  that  had  not  children,  brothers,  uncles,  or 


Three  Great  Industries  of  the  Lakes       333 

nephews  among  the  traders.  There  came  to  be 
in  the  woods  a  distinct  class  of  men  known  as 
coureurs  de  bois,  or  rangers  of  the  forest,  who  had 
escaped  from  the  restraints  of  civilized  life  and 
reported  themselves  only  once  or  twice  a  year  at 
the  trading  posts. 

The  government  tried  to  stem  the  rush 
of  young  men  into  the  wilderness  by  requiring 
licenses  for  trading  with  the  Indians  and  limit- 
ing  the  number  to  seventy-five  a  year ;  but  the 
country  was  too  large  and  remote  and  the  gov- 
ernment too  feeble  to  carry  out  any  such  policy. 
In  the  end  the  rulers  turned  their  attention 
instead  to  providing  fortified  trading  posts  for 
these  wanderers,  first  to  afford  defence  against 
the  Indians,  and  more  especially  to  concentrate 
and  monopolize  the  trade,  protecting  it  from  the 
rival  Englishmen.  These  forts  also  made  a  claim 
of  possession  in  the  regions  which  they  com- 
manded. Thus  Mackinac,  Detroit,  Niagara, 
Green  Bay,  Oswego,  and  a  dozen  minor  posts 
sprang  up. 

Travellers  of  the  eighteenth  century  were  likely 
to  meet  on  any  one  of  the  lakes  fleets  of  fifty  or 
sixty  canoes,  heavily  laden  with  beaver,  otter, 
mink,  and  marten  skins,  and  paddled  by  Indians 


334         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

in  their  paint  and  feathers,  or  by  hardly  less 
picturesque  coureurs  de  bois  in  their  blanket  coats, 
leathern  moccasins  and  leggings,  and  scarlet  sash 
and  cap.  These  men  were  no  mere  traders  whose 
knowledge  was  limited  to  prices  and  profits. 
They  were  experts  not  only  in  the  science  of  the 
woods  but  also  in  the  arts  of  diplomacy.  The 
success  of  the  trade  depended  on  the  mainten- 
ance of  peace  between  the  various  Indian  tribes 
and  groups  of  tribes ;  and  the  life  of  the  individ- 
ual trader,  as  well  as  his  earnings,  depended  on 
his  own  adaptability.  There  came  in  time  to  be 
leaders  to  whom  the  most  difficult  negotiations 
with  the  Indians  were  left.  Daniel  de  Greyselon 
Du  Luth,  a  prince  among  coureurs  de  bois,  was 
the  chief  hero  of  the  early  French  period  in  the 
upper  country.  In  the  summer  of  1679  ne 
made  a  tour  of  Minnesota,  planting  with  all 
ceremony  the  arms  of  France  in  the  leading 
Indian  villages,  many  of  which  he  was  the  first 
Frenchman  to  visit.  At  the  end  of  the  summer 
he  held  on  the  shores  of  Lake  Superior,  near 
the  site  of  the  present  city  of  Duluth,  a  great, 
Indian  council  of  chiefs  from  all  these  villages, 
and  negotiated  a  treaty  of  peace.  The  city  that 
bears  his  name  may  well  be  proud  of  the  fact 


Three  Great  Industries  of  the  Lakes       335 

that  after  ten  years  among  the  Indians  he  entered 
a  written  protest,  still  preserved  in  the  archives 
of  Canada,  with  his  disapproval  of  the  sale  of 
whiskey  and  brandy  to  the  natives.  These  lead- 
ers were  very  important  to  the  success  of  the  ad- 
ministration in  Canada  and  were  relied  on  and 
treated  with  all  respect.  Their  names  were  even 
sent  across  the  ocean,  as  we  see  in  the  laconic  but 
warm  commendation  of  Du  Luth  sent  by  the 
Governor  of  Canada  in  his  colonial  report  of 
1710:  "Captain  Du  Luth  died  this  winter;  he 
was  a  very  honest  man." 

After  the  fall  of  New  France,  a  time  of  chaos 
followed  in  the  wilderness.  With  the  restraint 
of  the  strictly  enforced  code  of  French  rule 
removed,  with  a  host  of  French  traders  in  the 
woods  who  did  not  yield  to  British  control,  and 
with  an  opportunity  for  rivalry  and  ill-feeling 
between  every  two  traders,  Indians  as  well  as 
white  men  became  demoralized  and  the  profits 
decreased  greatly.  Then  twenty-three  merchants 
of  Montreal  formed  the  Northwest  Fur  Company 
(1783)  and  took  into  their  employ  two  thousand 
French  and  other  fur  traders.  They  traded  with 
the  Indians  of  the  Northwest,  with  Mackinac  as 
a  centre.  A  rival  company  soon  started  compe- 


336         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

tition  in  the  southern  region  of  Wisconsin,  Illi- 
nois, and  the  Mississippi  Valley.  A  careful 
statement  concerning  the  British  trade  was  sent  to 
the  authorities  in  Canada  in  1790,  when  the  pos- 
sible future  evacuation  of  the  southern  shores 
of  the  lakes  was  beginning  to  be  considered. 
By  this  estimate  the  average  produce  of  furs  and 
skins  amounted  for  ten  years  to  two  hundred 
thousand  pounds  a  year.  How  this  was  dis- 
tributed among  the  various  lake  posts  is  shown 
in  the  following  table  :  — 

Statement  concerning  Trade  at  Detroit  and  Other  Posts 

POUNDS 

The  whole  Country  &  Posts  below  Montreal  30,000 

The  Grand  River,  the  North  Side  of  the  Lakes 

Ontario,  Huron,  &  Superior  30,000 

In   the   Country   generally   called  the   North 

West  40,000 

In   the   Countries  to  the   Southward   of  the 

Lakes,   the  Trade  of  which  is  principally 

brought  to  the  posts  of  Detroit  and  Mich- 

illimackinac,  there  being  very  little  Indian 

Trade  at  Niagara  100,000 

As  above  ^200,000 

Dividing  this  general  estimate  into  smaller  dis- 
tricts, the  estimate  was  as  follows  :  — 


Three  Great  Industries  of  the  Lakes       337 

In  the  District  of  the  Garrison  of  Detroit  PACKS 
The  Fort  of  Detroit,  Sagana  &  the  South 

Side  of  Lake  Huron  I  ooo 

Miamis  &  Wabash  Country  2000 

Sandusky  400 

Say  3400  packs  of 
Furrs  estimated  at  iz£  each  is  ^40,800 

In  the  District  of  Michillimackinac  : 

On  Lake  Michigan  PACKS 

The  Grand  River  100 

St.  Josephs  300 

Checago  I  oo 

Milwaki  1 20 
La  Bay  or  Green  Bay,  including  the  upper 
ports  of  the  Mississippi,  the  South  Side 

of  Lake  Superior  300 

The  Illinois  Country  600 

Say  3220  packs  of 
Furrs  estimated  at  £20  each  ^60,400 

Total  of  the  two  Districts  ^101,200 

This  estimate  was  sent  to  the  colonial  office  to 
show  that  if  the  lake  posts  were  ceded  to  America, 
at  least  half  if  not  seven-tenths  of  the  Indian 
trade  would  be  lost. 

The  Americans  were  not  ignorant  of  this  great 
opportunity  for  trade.  When  the  lake  posts 


338         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

were  evacuated  by  the  British  in  1796,  they 
began  to  take  a  hand  in  the  competition.  The 
United  States  government  sent  out  agents,  and 
John  Jacob  Astor  found  a  field  for  his  business 
enterprise.  In  1809  he  organized  the  American 
Fur  Company,  and  two  years  later  he  bought  out 
the  Mackinaw  Company  and  the  Northwest 
Company  south  of  the  boundary  line.  His 
plan  to  unite  the  Pacific  and  the  Great  Lakes 
failed  for  the  time  being,  and  the  War  of  1812 
interfered  with  his  schemes ;  but  his  organization 
of  the  lake  trade  did  its  work  in  turning  the 
stream  of  profits  southward  of  the  border  and 
Americanizing  Lake  Superior. 

The  settlements  built  up  by  the  fur  trade  were 
unique  and  amazing  when  we  consider  their  isola- 
tion in  the  midst  of  the  wilderness.  With  Mack- 
inac  under  French  rule  we  are  somewhat  familiar, 
having  visited  it  With  La  Salle  and  Saint  Lusson. 
At  Fort  William,  at  the  western  end  of  Lake  Su- 
perior, the  British  merchants  built  an  establishment 
that  reminds  one  of  the  feudal  castles  of  the  Old 
World.  In  1805  the  Canadian  companies  awoke 
to  the  fact  that  the  old  Grand  Portage,  the  former 
gateway  of  the  North,  was  on  territory  claimed 
by  the  American  government.  They  promptly 


Three  Great  Industries  of  the  Lakes       339 

demolished  their  old  fort  there,  and  built  Fort 
William,  forty-five  miles  north  of  the  portage. 
There  they  established  a  village  surrounded  by  a 
high  palisade,  within  which  stood  a  big  central 
building,  a  counting-house,  a  doctor's  residence, 
stores  for  merchandise  and  depots  for  furs,  work- 
shops for  mechanics,  —  carpenters,  coopers, 
blacksmiths,  tinsmiths,  and  canoe  builders,  - 
boarding-houses  for  traders,  a  powder-house  and 
guard-house,  and  not  the  least  necessary  of  the 
many  buildings,  a  jail.  Outside  the  palisade  was  a 
long  wharf,  a  ship-building  yard,  a  cemetery,  and  a 
considerable  line  of  log  houses  and  Indian  wigwams. 
The  great  feature  of  the  settlement,  however, 
was  the  central  building.  This  wooden  edifice 
stood  in  the  middle  of  a  spacious  square  and  had 
a  long  balcony,  five  feet  from  the  ground.  In 
the  centre,  flanked  by  rows  of  apartments,  was  a 
great  dining  hall,  sixty  feet  long  by  thirty  wide, 
where  two  hundred  agents,  partners,  clerks,  inter- 
preters, guides,  and  visitors  could  dine.  Across 
the  upper  end  of  the  hall  was  stretched  a  very 
large  map  of  the  Indian  country,  with  all  the 
Northwest  Company's  posts  and  routes  from  the 
Great  Lakes  to  Hudson  Bay  and  the  Pacific, — 
probably  the  only  accurate  map  of  that  region 


340         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

on  the  continent,  save  for  its  smaller  copies  in 
the  factories  themselves.  Along  the  sides  of  the 
room  were  portraits  of  various  proprietors  of  the 
company,  a  bust  of  Simon  McTavish,  a  pioneer 
member  of  the  company  and  long  its  head,  a 
full-length  portrait  of  Nelson,  and  a  painting  of 
the  battle  of  the  Nile. 

To  this  post  came  every  spring  from  Montreal 
two  of  the  directors  of  the  company,  with  a 
retinue  of  cooks,  bakers,  clerks,  and  attendants, 
and  in  the  great  hall  from  the  last  of  May  to  the 
end  of  August  there  was  always  high  carnival  of 
feasting  and  merriment.  In  this  room,  too,  were 
held  the  parliaments  of  the  fur  trade,  when  with 
all  solemnity  the  Scottish  chiefs  regulated  the 
affairs  of  the  company  and  shrewdly  made  their 
bargains  and  estimated  their  earnings.  About 
them  gathered  a  host  of  traders,  coming  every 
day  out  of  the  bleak  wilderness  to  enjoy  the  good 
cheer  of  this  metropolis  of  the  Northwest  and 
spend  their  hard-earned  gains  in  the  short  sum- 
mer holiday ;  and  with  these  came  a  legion  of 
half-breeds,  Indians,  and  hangers-on.  It  was 
a  picturesque  and  motley  throng.  Ross  Cox, 
visiting  there  in  1817,  found  natives  of  every 
part  of  the  British  Isles,  of  France,  Germany^ 


Three  Great  Industries  of  the  Lakes       341 

Italy,  Denmark,  Sweden,  Holland,  and  Switzer- 
land, and,  in  the  capacity  of  servants,  of  Africa, 
the  Sandwich  Islands,  and  Bengal.  "In  their  fea- 
tures," he  says, "  all  shades  of  the  human  species,— 
in  their  dress,  all  the  varied  hues  of  the  rainbow." 
If  the  paddle  and  moccasin  of  the  fur  trader 
had  been  the  pathfinder  for  the  lake  region,  the 
axe  of  the  lumberman  and  the  pick  of  the  miner 
who  followed  them  opened  up  and  cleared  the 
wilderness.  The  fur  trader  had  discovered  and 
explored  the  wilderness.  He  was  driven  out  by 
the  lumberman  and  miner,  who  spoiled  his  field 
with  such  speed  that  in  a  decade  or  two  fur 
trading  as  a  leading  industry  was  banished  to 
more  distant  regions.  The  newcomers  made  a  \ 
place  for  their  successors,  the  pioneer  farmers  and 
settlers,  by  clearing  and  preparing  the  country. 
Extensive  lumbering  and  mining  operations  \ 
came  only  with  the  Americans.  For  two  hun- 
dred years  the  French  and  English  tried  to  keep 
the  western  part  of  the  lake  region  a  wilderness 
and  preserve  for  hunting.  The  French  did  it  by 
instinct,  for  they  preferred  the  wild,  free  life  it 
offered  them ;  the  English  did  it  by  policy.  In 
the  Parliament  of  Great  Britain  leading  legislators 
argued  for  the  restriction  of  immigration,  so  that 


The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

the  hunting-grounds  should  not  be  disturbed. 
By  a  royal  proclamation  of  1763  the  valley  of  the 
Ohio  and  the  country  about  the  Great  Lakes  was 
declared  closed  to  settlement  or  purchase  of  land 
without  special  leave  or  license.  A  forest  pre- 
serve was  created,  and  the  northwest  country  was 
designated  by  the  English  "  the  habitation  of 
bears  and  beavers."  Only  with  the  coming  of 
the  Americans  was  the  lake  region  developed, 
and  the  first  signs  of  the  approaching  civilization 
were  the  cutting  down  of  forests  and  the  mining 
of  copper  and  iron  deposits. 

Two  great  divisions  are  recognized  in  the  forest 
distribution  of  the  United  States,  —  the  Atlantic 
and  the  Pacific.  These  are  separated  by  the 
great  interior  plains  and  prairies  of  the  conti- 
nent. The  line  of  cleavage  between  timber  land 
and  prairie  is  nowhere  so  defined  that  it  does  not 
have  inlets  of  prairie  land  in  the  forest  region, 
and  stretches  of  wooded  land  in  the  plain,  but 
the  Mississippi  River  is  in  general  the  western 
boundary  of  the  Atlantic  forest  area,  and  the 
states  of  the  Great  Lakes  are  all  included  in 
this  section.  Within  this  eastern  forest  there 
are  several  belts  of  different  kinds  of  woods. 
Two  of  these  are  in  the  lake  states.  The  north-  ~1 


Three  Great  Industries  of  the  Lakes 


343 


ern  belt,  largely  of  white  pine  mixed  with  red  or 
Norway  pine,  stretches  from  JNew^ England  across 
New  York  State  and  northern  Pennsylvania  to 
Wisconsin  and  the  eastern  part  of  Minnesota, 
and  is  broken  only  by  Lake  Erie.  This  tract 
has  been  the  chief  source  of  supply  for  the 
United  States.  South  of  this  white  pine  belt 
runs^a  central  h_ardwopd  section,  where  are  par- 
ticularly valuable  forests  of  hickory,  maple,  oak, 
and  walnut.  This  section  extends  from  Niagara 
eastward  into  New  York,  and  westward  across 
the  northern  parts  of  Ohio,  Indiana,  and  Illinois. 
As  it  was  in  the  natural  line  of  migration  both 
from  the  rivers  of  the  south  and  the  lakes  of  the 
north,  this  central  belt  was  cut  long  before  the 
pine  sections  were  touched.  It  fell  out  in  this 
way,  therefore,  that  for  three-quarters  of  a  cen- 
tury these  states  have  been  in  the  main  agricul- 
tural, rather  than  forest  lands. 

Michigan,  Wisconsin,  and  Minnesota  have 
had  a  long  history  of  lumber  prosperity.  The 
first  railroads  of  Michigan  were  welcomed  by  the 
settlers  as  a  means  of  transporting  lumber  from 
the  logging-camps  and  sawmills  that  were  spring- 
ing up  all  through  the  central  part  of  the  state. 
The  northern  industry  was  taken  care  of  by  the 


344         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

lake  vessels,  which  took  the  lumber  from  the  ports 
on  the  shore  through  the  straits  of  Mackinac. 
Lake  Superior,  which  had  long  been  a  centre  for 
the  shifting  fur  trade,  was  settled  permanently  for 
the  first  time  by  the  men  who  were  brought  by 
lumber  interests.  The  Mackinac  region,  the 
Saginaw  and  St.  Croix  rivers,  and  many  smaller 
streams  became  the  scenes  during  the  winter 
months  of  a  busy  and  picturesque  activity,  and 
have  been  associated  ever  since  in  fact  and  fiction 
with  the  romance  as  well  as  the  profit  of  the  lum- 
ber industry.  As  Rochester  in  the  East  had  be- 
gun with  a  sawmill,  so  Duluth  and  Superior  in 
the  West  came  into  being  as  supply  stations  for 
the  rivermen,  and  their  prosperity  depended  in 
1870  so  largely  on  the  lumber  traffic  that  the 
contest  over  the  railroads,  which  each  place  wanted 
on  its  side  of  the  state  line,  was  determined  by 
the  interests  and  preferences  of  the  lumber  kings. 
No  accurate  record  of  the  entire  amount  of 
lumber  produced  was  made  in  the  first  decades 
of  the  industry,  but  in  1890  Michigan,  Wiscon- 
sin, and  Minnesota  were  cutting  more  than  one- 
third  of  all  the  lumber  supply  of  the  United 
States,  and  to  this  Michigan  contributed  one- 
half  the  amount  credited  to  the  three  states,  and 


Three  Great  Industries  of  the  Lakes       345 

one-fifth  of  the  whole  product  of  the  country. 
Four-fifths  of  Michigan  was  then  reported  to  be 
I  forested,  —  a  record  leading  that  of  any  other  state. 
As  early  as  1850  the  Michigan  lumber  busi- 
ness was  so  large  as  to  attract  attention  through- 
out commercial  centres  of  the  country,  and  it 
grew  with  the  amazing  rapidity  of  all  western 
development.  In  1854  there  were  in  the  state  , 
sixty-one  sawmills  with  an  output  of  108  million  / 
feet;  in  1872  there  were  fifteen  hundred  saw- 
mills, to  say  nothing  of  all  the  other  activities 
incident  on  lumbering,  such  as  making  shingles 
and  planing.  By  1881  the  amount  had  jumped 
to  nearly  forty  million  feet,  and  it  was  calculated 
that  the  output  of  Michigan  mills  that  year  would 
have  loaded  a  train  of  cars  nearly  twenty-five  hun- 
dred miles  long. 

These  figures  have  come  from  the  western 
states,  but  here  as  everywhere  else  the  cities  and 
states  of  the  lakes  show  their  interdependence. 
Buffalo,  at  the  eastern  extremity  of  Lake  Erie, 
becomes  one  of  the  leading  lumber  markets  of  the 
world  by  reason  of  the  immense  shipments  that 
come  to  it  from  the  upper  lakes.  In  1907  Buffalo  \ 
had  one  hundred  and  thirty-two  lumber  firms,  and 
an  annual  output  from  her  yards  of  over  two 


346         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

hundred  million  feet  of  pine  and  over  one  hun- 
dred and  fifty  million  feet  of  hardwood.  This 
product  was  made  up  of  the  best  species  of  pines, 
sought  for  by  all  dealers,  and  the  hardwood  em- 
braced every  known  variety  of  American  trees. 

It  is  beginning  to  be  evident  that  this  pace 
cannot  be  kept  up  without  exhausting  the  forests. 
In  1903  the  cut  from  the  three  northern  states 
was  not  fifty  million  feet,  a  smaller  cut  than  any 
year  since  1878  and  hardly  more  than  half  that 
of  1890.  To  the  danger  involved  in  reckless 
cutting  without  reforesting  our  people  and  legis- 
lators have  become  aroused,  and  these  states  are 
matching  their  past  leadership  in  output  by  a 
corresponding  activity  in  protecting  their  forest 
areas.  Minnesota  led  in  having  an  effective 
system  of  fire-wardens,  and  each  state  is  creating 
forestry  commissions  and  buying  up  preserves. 
In  thus  rescuing  from  destruction  our  forests  no 
one  can  be  too  prompt  or  too  energetic.  Less 
than  a  hundred  years  of  occupation  of  the  lake 
region  must  not  wipe  out  this  industry  or  destroy 
the  natural  beauty  and  resources  of  the  country. 
The  fur  trade  had  to  go  before  the  advance  of 
civilization ;  the  lumber  industry  must  not  be 
allowed  to  follow  in  its  wake. 


Three  Great  Industries  of  the  Lakes       347 

The  fur  trade  was    at  its  height   in  1820    and  \ 
was  seriously  on  the  wane  by   1835  ;  tne  lumber 
industry  was    of  a  size  to   be  reckoned  with  by 
1 830  ;  in  the  next  decade,  between  1 840  and  i  $$o^> 
the  mineral   industry   came  into  existence.      The 
earliest  explorers  had  known  of  the  presence  in 
the   Lake   Superior  region  of  large   deposits  of 
virgin  copper.     References  are  made  to  these  de- 
posits in  the  Jesuit  "  Relations."     The  first  at-\ 
tempt  at  mining  was  made  in  1770  by  Alexander  / 
Henry,  the  trader  at  Mackinac,  after  the  Indian  ' 
wars  were  over,  but  he  was  not  successful. 

With  the  coming  of  the  Americans,  copper^ 
mining  began  in  earnest.  Indeed,  it  was  said  by 
a  friend,  who  told  the  story  twenty  years  after  the 
conversation,  that  Benjamin  t  Franklin  told  him 
that  when  he  was  drawing  the  treaty  of  peace  in 
Paris  he  had  access  to  the  journals  and  charts  of  a 
corps  of  French  engineers  who  had  been  explor- 
ing Lake  Superior,  and  that  he  drew  the  line 
through  Lake  Superior  to  include  the  best  and 
largest  supply  of  copper  in  the  American  posses- 
sions. "  The  time  will  come/'  said  Franklin, 
"  when  drawing  that  line  will  be  considered  the 
greatest  service  I  ever  rendered  my  country." 

Copper    and    silver  were    the    minerals   whose 


348          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

discovery  created  the  most  enthusiasm,  and 
several  companies  were  formed  for  their  mining 
in  the  thirties  and  forties  after  the  expedition  of 
Governor  Cass.  Of  these  at  the  time  of  the 
Civil  War  only  two  were  paying  dividends.  In 
1865  the  Calumet  and  Hecla  mines  were  started 
and  began  to  develop  that  part  of  the  rich  upper 
peninsula  of  Michigan  known  as  Keweenaw  Point. 
From  that  time  the  mines  have  sent  out  yearly 
thousands  of  tons,  and  millions  of  dollars  are 
realized  every  year  from  them.  Until  1 880,  when 
copper  was  found  in  Montana  and  Arizona, 
Michigan  was  the  only  source  of  supply  in  the 
United  States,  and  sent  out  five-sixths  of  the 
nation's  whole  product.  Since  that  time  her  out- 
put has  trebled,  but  owing  to  the  great  increase  of 
mining  in  the  West  this  tremendous  tonnage  of 
copper  is  to-day  only  one-fourth  of  the  total,  al- 
though still  a  most  important  factor  in  the  con- 
tribution of  the  lake  region  to  the  wealth  of  the 
country. 

The  presence  of  iron  ore  in  the  Lake  SuperioK 
country  was    hardly   suspected  until   after    1840.^ 
All  companies  were  formed  to  mine  copper,  silver, 
or  gold.     The  state  geologist  made  no  mention 
of  iron  in  his  first  report  in  1840,  but  in  Septem- 


5 


Three  Great  Industries  of  the  Lakes       349 

her,  1 844,  a  party  of  government  surveyors  run- 
ning the  lines  of  a  township  twelve  miles  west  of 
Marquette,  noticed  the  deflection  of  their  compass 
needle.  The  party  was  under  the  leadership  of 
Mr.  Burt,  the  inventor  of  the  solar  compass,  and 
he  was  overjoyed  to  find  his  instrument  working 
according  to  his  predictions.  The  deflection  was 
so  great  that  he  summoned  his  party  and  sent 
them  out  in  all  directions  to  search  for  the  iron 
which  he  was  convinced  must  exist  in  large  quan- 
tities in  the  near  vicinity.  Every  one  of  them  re- 
turned in  a  short  time  with  specimens  of  the  ore. 
Thus  was  discovered  the  first  of  the  famous  ranges 
that  to-day  produce  one-third  of  all  the  iron  mined 
in  the  United  States. 

At  the  time  of  the  discovery  of  iron  deposits  - 
there  were  not  over  fifty  people  in  Marquette 
County.  Expeditions  were  fitted  out  in  each 
succeeding  year,  and  companies,  began  to  operate 
the  mines.  They  worked  against  great  natural 
obstacles  in  the  remote  wilderness.  It  is  hard 
for  us  to  realize  how  far  out  of  the  world  this 
country  seemed  at  that  time.  When  Michigan 
was  admitted  as  a  state  in  1837,  tne  reception 
of  the  upper  peninsula  in  compensation  for  a 
cession  to  Ohio  of  the  well-known  Toledo  tract 


350         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

was  regarded  with  the  greatest  dissatisfaction. 
The  "  State  Gazetteer  "  of  that  year  spoke  of 
the  new  possession  as  a  wild  tract  of  twenty 
thousand  miles  of  howling  wilderness,  while  one 
of  the  political  songs  of  the  time  told  with  scorn 
how  the  people  were  being  coerced  into  trading 
away  the  southern  land  for  "  that  poor  frozen 
land  of  Michigan."  Within  twenty  years  that 
sentiment  underwent  a  swift  and  radical  change. 
The  first  companies  struggled  along  in  the 
wilderness  carrying  their  ore  to  a  forge  on  the 
Carp  River,  bringing  it  first  by  Indian  trail  and 
then  by  wagon  road  twelve  miles  down  to  the 
waterside,  where  it  was  loaded  on  sailing  vessels 
by  being  put  on  wheelbarrows  and  rolled  up  a 
steep  plank.  In  1852  the  Marquette  Iron  Com- 
pany shipped  six  barrels  by  this  laborious  method 
to  Cleveland,  which  was  the  first  ever  received 
from  Lake  Superior.  The  first  considerable 
shipment  was  one  of  five  thousand  tons  three  i 
years  later.  Then  the  great  panic  of  1857 
stopped  people  for  the  time  being  from  ventur- 
ing their  money  in  new  and  unproved  enter- 
prises ;  but  the  Civil  War  created  a  great  demand 
for  iron,  and  from  that  time  the  industry  has 
flourished. 


Three  Great  Industries  of  the  Lakes       351 

When  transportation  facilities  were  needed,  the 
"  Soo"  Canal  was  built,  and  at  that  very  time  Mr.  f 
Heman  B.  Ely  began  an  agitation  for  the  build- 
ing of  a  railroad  in  this  region.  Owing  to  his 
influence  and  under  his  direction  the  Iron  Moun- 
tain Road  was  built  from  Marquette  to  the  shore 
of  Lake  Superior,  the  first  road  in  the  whole 
northern  country.  Mr.  Ely  was  well  known  in 
other  lake  states,  as  well  as  being  one  of  the 
leading  pioneers  in  the  north.  He  had  built 
the  first  telegraph  lines  from  Buffalo  to  Detroit 
and  from  Cleveland  to  Pittsburg,  had  been  presi- 
dent of  a  railroad  company  at  Cleveland  whose 
holdings  were  the  foundation  of  the  Lake  Shore 
and  Michigan  Southern,  and  was  director  of  the 
Northern  Pacific.  He  was  in  all  his  activities 
a  leader  to  whom  the  Great  Lakes  owe  much. 
Railroads  built  during  these  years  in  Ohio  and 
Pennsylvania  helped  to  solve  the  problem  of  iron 
transportation,  while  the  freight  traffic  in  iron  ore 
helped  these  young  roads  to  live.  The  enor- 
mous demand  for  iron,  due  to  the  great  era  of 
railroad  building,  made  furnaces  spring  up  in  the 
Cleveland,  Mahoning,  and  Shenango  valleys,  and 
the  Michigan  industry  was  fairly  launched. 

For  a  long  time  only  the  Michigan  and  Wis- 


352          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

consin  ranges  were  worked,  but  in  1875  the 
presence  of  large  deposits  in  the  Vermilion 
Range  of  Minnesota  was  brought  by  Mr.  George 
Stone  to  the  attention  of  Charlemagne  Tower,  a 
prominent  lawyer  and  business  man  of  Pennsyl- 
vania. Mr.  Tower  had  had  large  experience  in 
coal  mining,  both  in  the  examination  of  coal 
fields  in  Pennsylvania  for  his  cases  in  the  law 
courts,  and  as  an  owner  and  manager  of  com- 
panies. He  sent  an  expedition  to  explore  the 
Minnesota  ranges,  and  becoming  convinced  of 
their  wealth  proceeded  at  once  to  their  develop- 
ment. The  friends  and  business  associates  whom 
he  endeavored  to  enlist  in  this  venture  were 
sceptical,  so  Mr.  Tower  had  to  proceed  single- 
handed  in  his  task. 

It  is  little  wonder  that  men  doubted  the 
practicability  of  Mr.  Tower's  schemes ;  it  is  the 
more  worthy  of  admiration  that  he  dared  to 
undertake  them  amid  the  almost  insuperable 
obstacles.  To  plant  a  mining  establishment 
ninety  miles  north  of  Duluth  and  seventy  miles 
west  in  a  direct  line  from  Lake  Superior  in  a 
region  that  had  no  intermediate  connections  with 
even  the  outskirts  of  civilization  seemed  an 
impossible  task.  The  country  was  densely 


From  Stereograph,  copyright,  1906,  by  Underwood  &  Underwood,  New  York. 

IRON  ORE  AT  A  LAKE  SUPERIOR  PORT 


Three  Great  Industries  of  the  Lakes       353 

wooded,  with  only  very  small  streams  and  im- 
passable swamps  breaking  the  forest  stretch. 
Provisions,  supplies,  tools,  —  everything  needed 
for  the  camp  must  be  taken  either  in  midwinter 
over  frozen  ground  and  snow  when  the  tempera- 
ture was  usually  forty  degrees  below  zero,  or  in 
summer  on  the  backs  of  men  and  in  Indian 
canoes  over  a  most  circuitous  route.  A  railroad 
must  be  built  to  carry  the  ore,  and  dock  and 
harbor  facilities  must  be  provided  on  Lake  Supe- 
rior. All  this  Charlemagne  Tower  undertook  at 
the  age  of  seventy-three,  and  carried  through  to 
a  wonderful  success.  He  built  a  railroad  from 
the  mines  to  Two  Harbors  on  Lake  Superior ; 
he  selected  Two  Harbors  as  the  best  place  for 
his  docks,  roundhouses,  machine-shops,  and  saw- 
mills ;  and  he  opened  up  his  mines  in  the  iron 
district. 

In  August,  1884,  the  railroad  was  finished  and 
the  first  shipments  of  ore  were  made.  These 
shipments  were  shrewdly  distributed  among  manu- 
facturers of  three  states  leading  in  iron  industries, 
Illinois,  Ohio,  and  Pennsylvania,  instead  of  being 
sent  to  a  single  dealer.  They  met  with  instant 
favor  from  all  the  companies.  The  quality  of  all 
the  northern  ranges  had  been  found  to  be  very 

2  A 


CHAPTER   XXVI 

SHIPPING    ON    THE    LAKES 

NOWHERE  has  the  life  of  the  Great 
Lakes  developed  more  clearly  an  indi- 
viduality of  its  own  than  in  its  ship- 
ping. The  conditions  which  confronted  the 
navigators  on  these  great  inland  seas  were  pe- 
culiar to  their  environment.  The  size  of  the  \ 
lakes  made  types  of  vessel  designed  for  ocean  use  / 
more  suitable  than  river  craft ;  yet  the  fact  that 
they  were  not  one  inland  sea,  but  a  succession  of 
lakes  divided  by  narrow  channels,  differentiated 
them  widely  from  the  ocean  both  in  the  needs  and 
possibilities  of  their  navigation.  To  meet  these 
special  conditions  and  to  suit  the  demands  of  the 
commerce  in  which  they  were  engaged  the  ship- 
builders of  the  lakes  have  designed  vessels  which 
are  unique  and  interesting. 

The  French  found  on  the  Great  Lakes  a  type\ 
of  boat  which  was    so    well  adapted  to  the  exi-   f 
gencies  of  combined  lake  and  river  travel  that  it 

356 


Shipping  on  the  Lakes  357 

has  persisted  to  this  day.  This  was  the  birch- 
bark  canoe.  But  it  was  not  the  small  pleasure 
canoe  of  our  modern  ideas.  Even  the  first 
canoes  that  the  Jesuit  fathers  found  the  Indians 
using  before  1630  were  large  enough  to  transport 
a  family  of  five  or  six  with  all  their  baggage,  their 
kettles,  blankets,  and  other  household  goods. 
With  the  development  of  the  fur  trade  and  the 
coming  of  white  men  in  large  numbers  the  canoes 
became  twenty^  and  thirty,  feet  Jong,  and  this  style 
persisted  as  the  main  water  craft  until  well  into 
the  nineteenth  century.  The  merchants  from 
Montreal  went  up  to  Fort  William  in  a  fleet  of 
ninety  canoes,  each  carrying  four  tons'  burden  and 
navigated  by  eight  or  ten  men,  and  as  late  as 
1820  the  furs  of  Lake  Superior  were  sent  south 
by  John  Jacob  Astor  from  his  depot  at  Mackinac 
to  the  trading  post  at  Chicago  in  similar  vessels. 
It  was  no  uncommon  occurrence  to  see  at  Mack- 
inac and  Detroit  a  flotilla  of  fifty  or  sixty  canoes 
sweep  up  to  the  shore,  the  Indians  paddling  si- 
lently and  the  voyageurs  singing  a  gay  Canadian 
boat-song  as  they  moved  their  paddles  in  swift 
unison  at  the  rate  of  forty  or  even  sixty  strokes  a 
minute.  These  men  measured  distances  by  the 
number  of  times  they  had  stopped  on  the  journey  to 


358         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

smoke,  and  would  tell  you  that  a  place  was 
"  three  or  four  pipes  away/*  because  the  call  had 
been  three  times  given  for  "pipes  —  pipes"  by 
the  steersman,  and  at  the  word  every  paddle  had 
been  drawn  in,  every  pipe  lighted,  and  a  few 
whiffs  taken  before  the  three-minute  rest  was  up 
and  they  started  on  again.  Sometimes  these 
rests  were  once  in  every  two  miles,  sometimes 
less  frequently,  and  with  their  help  the  men 
paddled  from  morning  to  night,  singing  as 
cheerily  after  their  forty-mile  run  as  in  the 
morning. 

Other   boats   were   used  by  the    Indians  and  V 
French,    but    not    so    universally.      The    Indian    \ 
pirogue  was  a  canoe-shaped   boat  hollowed    out   , 
of  one  of  the  huge  cotton-trees,  —  a  vessel  forty 
or  fifty  feet  long  and  holding  thirty  men,  but  too 
heavy  to  carry  easily  around  the  numerous  port- 
ages.     The    French    introduced    into    the    lakes 
in  the  eighteenth  century  the  bateau,  a  flat-bet-  / 
tomed    boat  with  sharp-pointed  ends,  which  re-  1 
sisted   the  storms  better  than  the  clumsy  scow 
barges,   and   was    the   precursor   of  the  present 
two-masted  Mackinaw  boat.     On  the  canoe  and 
bateau  sails  were  sometimes  used,  but  only  in  very 
favorable  weather,  and  in  any  of  these  boats  all  but 


Shipping  on  the  Lakes  359 

the  most  experienced  navigators  hugged  closely 
the  shores  of  the  stormy,  wind-swept  waters.  To 
us  with  our  eight  and  ten  and  twelve  thousand 
ton  steel  vessels,  which  find  the  lake  storms  a 
source  of  dread  and  danger,  it  seems  incredible 
that  the  greater  part  of  the  navigation  for  three 
centuries  was  in  these  frail,  light  canoes  and 
bateaux. 

With  the  story  of  the  pioneer  sailing  vessel  of 
La  Salle,  the  sixty-ton  Griffon  of  the  seventeenth 
century  design,  with  her  high  stern  deck  and  her 
two  masts  with  clumsy  square  sails,  we  are  already 
familiar.  After  she  was  lost  in  1679,  sailing  ves- 
sels did  not  again  appear  on  the  lakes  for  nearly 
seventy-five  years.  Then  there  were  two  on 
Lake  Superior,  one  the  property  of  the  man 
who  made  the  first  attempt  at  copper  mining  in 
that  region.  The  first  sailing  vessels  to  come 
into  historical  importance  were  the  Beaver  and 
the  Gladwin,  which  did  such  efficient  service  at 
the  siege  of  Detroit  in  1763.  War  brought 
out  the  need  of  such  vessels,  and  a  shipyard 
started  by  the  English  on  Navy  Island  in  the 
Niagara  River  turned  out  several  schooners  dur- 
ing the  next  few  years.  At  the  end  of  the  eigh- 
teenth century,  however,  the  entire  fleet  of  Lakes 


360         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

Huron,  Erie,  and  Michigan  consisted  of  only 
three  schooners  and  six  sloops,  and  no  one 
dreamed  of  the  commercial  changes  to  come 
before  another  century  was  over.  Under  the 
orders  of  the  English  government  a  Mr.  Collins 
had  made  in  1788  a  careful  survey  of  the  lakes 
and  had  stated  that  vessels  on  Lake  Ontario 
might  be  of  sixty  or  even  seventy-five  or  eighty 
tons,  but  those  on  the  other  lakes  should  not 
exceed  fifteen  tons'  burden;  but  the  ship-builders 
paid  little  attention  to  his  instructions. 

The  steamboat  made  its  appearance  on  the 
Great  Lakes  in  1818  in  the  shape  of  a  side- 
wheeler,  naively  called  the  Walk-in-the-Watery 
which  was  launched  at  Buffalo.  Even  a  con- 
temporary described  her  as  a  cc  weak  but  elegant 
boat,"  and  an  oil  painting  shows  her  to  be  a 
little  craft  with  a  curious  tiller  at  the  stern,  no 
pilot-house,  a  smoke  stack  of  six  lengths  of  stove- 
pipe put  together,  and  unboxed  wheels.  She  was 
a  profitable  venture  while  she  lasted,  making  the 
trip  from  Buffalo  to  Detroit  with  forty  or  fifty 
passengers,  each  of  whom  paid  eighteen  dollars, 
but  often  taking  thirteen  days  to  do  it.  For 
four  years  she  held  a  monopoly  on  the  lakes 
as  the  solitary  steam-propelled  craft,  and  then  one 


Shipping  on  the  Lakes  361 

stormy  night  in  October  she  went  ashore  after  rid- 
ing out  a  furious  gale.  None  of  her  passengers  were 
lost,  and  there  is  an  old  picture  portraying  this 
mournful  event,  "  one  of  the  greatest  misfortunes 
that  has  ever  befallen  us,"  as  a  journal  of  the  day 
said.  The  vessel  is  depicted  as  going  to  pieces 
on  the  shore  while  its  passengers  stand  up  straight 
in  unruffled  silk  hats,  pointing  apparently  at  spots 
of  interest  in  the  vicinity,  —  a  very  different  state 
of  affairs  from  that  told  of  by  those  who  spent 
that  fearful  night  on  the  little  vessel  hoping  for 
daylight  to  come  before  she  was  knocked  to 
pieces. 

The  u  steamboat   did    not    disappear  from    the 
lakes,  as  the  journal  had  feared  it  would,  but  in   I 
1827  the  first  steamboat  reached  Sault  Ste.  Marie,  f 
carrying  among  her  passengers  General  Winfield 
Scott,  who  came  to  visit  the  military  post  there. 
She  made  no   effort  to  pass   the  barrier   of  the 
rapids,  as  even  the  little  canal  built  by  the  North- 
west Company  in   1790  for  canoes   and  bateaux 
had  been   blown  up  in  the  War  of  1812.     The  ' 
first   steamboat   reached    Chicago    in    1832,   and  f 
from  that  time  on  they  began  to  multiply  on  the 
lakes.     It  was  not,  however,  till   1845   tnat  tne 
need  of  steam  navigation  for  working  successfully 


362         The  Story  of  the  Great   Lakes 

the  rich  copper  mines  south  of  Lake  Superior 
made  it  so  necessary  to  have  some  craft  not 
dependent  on  the  uncertainties  of  the  wind  that 
the  mine  owners  combined  and  bought  a  little 
steamboat  which  they  had  hauled  laboriously 
over  the  portage  on  rollers,  an  undertaking  that 
occupied  seven  weeks. 

The  great  need  of  connecting  the  rich  Lake 
Superior  region  with  the  other  lakes,  —  urged 
upon  the  people  for  twenty  years,  —  brought 
about  in  1855  the  building  of  the  "Soo"  Canal.  .J 
After  much  discussion  Congress  voted  in  1852 
three-quarters  of  a  million  acres  of  land  to  aid 
the  state  of  Michigan  in  building  this  canal. 
This  was  done  in  spite  of  the  opposition  of 
many  Eastern  members  to  spending  so  much 
money  on  a  project  for  so  remote  a  wilderness. 
The  type  and  size  of  the  canal  was  fought  over 
by  engineers  and  statesmen,  and  it  was  finally 
agreed  that  a  lock  two  hundred  and  fifty  feet 
long  would  provide  amply  for  any  vessels  that 
would  ever  navigate  those  waters.  A  young  man 
who  was  visiting  at  Sault  Ste.  Marie  at  the  time, 
Mr.  Charles  T.  Harvey,  became  convinced  that 
this  was  too  small  an  estimate.  Mr.  Harvey  was 
neither  an  engineer  nor  a  canal  builder,  but  was 


Shipping  on  the  Lakes  363 

a  man  with  foresight.  He  went  before  the  legis- 
lature with  plans,  drawn  under  his  direction  by  a 
New  York  engineer,  for  a  lock  at  least  one  hun- 
dred feet  longer,  and  was  met  with  ridicule.  The 
longest  vessel  on  the  lakes  was  then  only  one 
hundred  and  sixty-seven  feet,  and  the  lock  pro- 
posed by  Harvey  and  the  Fairbanks  Company, 
who  were  backing  him,  would  be  the  largest  lock 
in  the  world.  Harvey  won  his  point,  and  was 
given  charge  of  constructing  the  canal.  It  was  a 
tremendous  undertaking  for  those  days.  The 
nearest  railroad  was  many  hundred  miles  away ; 
the  steamboats  were  slow;  it  took  six  weeks  to 
get  a  reply  to  a  letter  mailed  to  New  York,  and 
agents  had  to  be  sent  to  that  city  to  get  gangs 
of  laborers  from  the  immigrant  population.  The 
temperature  on  the  Sault  was  at  thirty-five  de- 
grees below  zero  much  of  the  time  during  the 
winter  months,  and  the  men  were  necessarily 
poorly  housed  and  cared  for.  At  one  time  an 
epidemic  of  cholera  killed  ten  per  cent  of  the 
men,  but  work  went  on  each  day.  Again  two 
thousand  laborers  struck,  and  Harvey  hid  all 
the  provisions  in  the  woods  until  they  returned 
to  work,  which  they  did  in  twenty-four  hours. 
Within  two  years,  and  at  a  cost  of  less  than  a 


364         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

million  dollars,  the  canal  was  completed.  Im- 
mediately the  problems  of  lake  navigation  were 
entirely  changed.  One  of  the  difficulties  of  the 
cautious  Mr.  Collins  of  seventy  years  before, 
who  wanted  the  size  of  boats  limited  to  fifteen 
tons,  was  removed  in  the  building  of  a  channel 
around  the  rapids  of  the  Sault.  In  fifteen  years 
the  lock  was  enlarged  and  then  later  enlarged 
again,  till  in  1896  the  famous'  eight-hundred-foot 
Poe  lock  was  built  by  the  army  engineer  of  that 
name,  at  the  cost  of  four  million  dollars.  Mr. 
Harvey,  at  the  fiftieth  anniversary  of  the  build- 
ing of  his  first  lock,  came  to  the  celebration  of 
the  event  and  heard  discussion  of  the  possible 
need  of  a  lock  larger  than  the  present  one.  Thus 
in  the  memory  of  living  men  there  has  been  built 
up  a  great  commercial  marine  of  over  five  thousand 
vessels,  and  by  the  spending  of  fifty  millions 
of  dollars  in  deepening  all  the  lake  channels 
and  cutting  canals,  the  four  upper  lakes  have 
been  united  into  one  great  waterway  over  which 
passes  a  large  proportion  of  the  productive  wealth 
of  the  United  States.  Yearly  one  hundred  mil- 
lion tons  of  freight  pass  through  this  lock,  which 
is  twice  the  record  of  London  and  Liverpool 
combined  in  their  twelve-month  season. 


Shipping  on  the  Lakes  365 

With  the  opening  of  the  "  Soo  "  Canal  the  old 
conventional  type  of  lake  vessel  began  to  disap-  ) 
pear,  and  the  designs  were  accommodated  to  ' 
the  special  demands  of  trade  and  natural  condi- 
tions. The  sailing  vessel  is  coming  to  be  a  thing 
of  the  past,  and  the  men  who  navigated  the  tur- 
bulent waters  and  were  caught  in  gales  and  ice- 
jams  in  their  wooden  schooners  rejoice  in  its 
disappearance.  Since  1873  the  shipyards  have 
built  less  and  less  of  this  type  of  ship,  and  in 
our  own  day  the  steel  vessel  has  come  to  take 
its  place. 

The  canoe  served  its    purpose   for  fur  trade,  | 
and  the  schooner    for  lumber  ;   but  the  mineral  ; 
industries    of   Lake    Superior,  and  a  little   later  / 
the  grain    crops  of  the  West,  demanded  a  dif- 
ferent   kind    of   vessel.     With    the    coming    of 
steam  power  and  the  development  of  the  "  Soo  " 
Canal  came  into  being  the  style  of  vessel  which 
has  been  well  described  as  a  "  steel  trough  with 
a  lid  on  it."     These  vessels  are   built  solely  to 
carry  as  much  cargo  as  is  consistent  with  safety. 
They  are  huge  steel  freighters  five  and  six  hun- 
dred feet    long,  with  a  hold    whose    capacity    is 
from  six  to    twelve    thousand    tons  of  iron  ore 
or  a  like  amount  of  wheat.     Astern  is  the  ma- 


366          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

chinery  with  a  smoke  stack  and  a  row  of  cabins 
visible  above  the  deck,  and  three  or  four  hun- 
dred feet  off — the  length  of  a  city  block - 
is  the  deck-house,  containing  officers'  quarters 
with  the  wheel-house  and  bridge.  Within  this 
house  is  invariably  to  be  found  a  man  of  rare 
skill  and  experience.  To  the  casual  observer 
the  narrow  lake  passages  and  the  crowded, 
winding  channels  and  flats  of  the  rivers  would 
seem  to  preclude  so  long  and  unwieldy  a  craft, 
but  the  lake  sailor  can  navigate  her  with  the  string 
of  barges  which  she  often  has  in  tow  through  any 
passage  with  skill  and  ease.  The  bows  of  these 
vessels  are  high  and  rounded  to  meet  and  part  the 
heavy  waves  of  the  frequent  lake  storms,  and  the 
whole  shell  is  built  with  special  regard  to  strength, 
both  to  resist  these  gales  and  to  bear  the  impact 
of  the  thousands  of  tons  of  wheat  and  iron  which 
are  to  be  poured  from  grain  elevators  and  iron 
bins  into  their  holds.  A  crew  of  twenty-five  men 
can  handle  one  of  these  vessels,  but  they  have  no 
easy  time  on  long  stretches  between  ports.  They 
must  be  ever  on  the  alert  in  their  short,  swift 
trips  from  lake  to  lake. 

In  the  short  summer  season  the  motto   of  lake   N 
transportation  is  speed,  and   science  has  bent  its  / 


Shipping  on  the  Lakes  367 

energies  most  successfully  to  that  end.  Up  in 
the  mines  of  Michigan  and  Minnesota  a  big 
steam-operated  bucket  dips  down  into  the  earth 
and  scoops  from  the  hillside  a  load  of  iron  ore 
which  it  dumps  into  steel  cars  with  openings  at 
the  bottom,  at  a  cost  of  five  cents  a  ton  !  At  the 
docks  of  Lake  Superior,  —  and  the  total  length 
of  the  ore  docks  on  the  lake  is  well  over  five 
miles, — the  bottom  of  the  car  is  turned  aside 
and  the  whole  load  of  red  earth  rushes  either 
down  long  chutes  directly  into  the  holds  of  the 
vessels,  or  into  big  buildings  called  bins  or  pockets, 
from  which  it  can  be  poured  from  a  great  height 
into  the  vessels  filling  them  at  fifteen  or  sixteen 
hatches  simultaneously.  Such  records  have  been 
made  as  the  loading  of  more  than  ten  thousand 
tons  of  iron  ore  into  a  steamer  in  less  than  an 
hour  and  a  half,  and  the  usual  time  for  the  oper- 
ation is  only  three  or  four  hours.  The  cost  of 
this  loading  is  made,  by  the  use  of  this  machinery, 
less  than  three  cents  a  ton.  After  the  swiftest 
passage  that  can  be  made  the  vessel  reaches  the 
ports  of  the  lower  lakes,  and  there  the  devices  for 
unloading  are  even  more  wonderful.  From  a 
bridgelike  crane  hangs  a  huge  scoop  shaped  like  a 
clam-shell,  which  dips  down  into  the  vessel's  hold 


368          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

and  pulls  out  ten  tons  of  ore  at  a  time,  swings  it 
to  one  side  and  drops  it  on  a  mountainous  heap 
of  red  earth.  From  there  it  is  put  into  steel  cars 
which,  at  the  furnaces  of  Pennsylvania,  are  picked 
off  the  track  by  an  immense  crane  as  though  they 
were  mere  children's  toys  and  dumped  on  the  ore 
piles  from  which  the  furnaces  are  fed.  In  the 
interval  while  the  ore  was  being  unloaded  from 
the  hold  of  the  vessel,  coal  for  the  return  cargo 
has  been  poured  in,  and  in  an  incredibly  short 
time  the  freighter  is  started  on  her  northward 
journey.  So  successfully  have  time  and  expense 
been  minimized  by  the  elimination  of  hand  labor 
that  the  freight  charges  of  the  lakes  are  the 
wonder  of  the  whole  commercial  world.  Of 
some  kinds  of  freight  the  cost  of  transporting 
a  ton  from  Buffalo  to  Duluth  is  only  eighty- 
five  cents.  The  railroads  have  given  up  the 
attempt  to  compete  and  have  bought  up  instead 
the  lines  of  steamers  with  which  they  make  con- 
nection. The  recent  tendency  on  the  lakes  i 
to  consolidation  of  ownership.  To-day  the  Pitts-  ^ 
burg  Steamship  Company  owns  a  fleet  of  one  jr 
hundred  and  eight  vessels,  whose  total  length  j 
if  put  in  one  long  line  would  be  over  eight 
miles.  These  fleets  are  many  times  the  size  of  , 


Shipping  on  the  Lakes  369 

those  owned  by  Americans  on  the  ocean.  In- 
deed, this  is  one  of  the  striking  contrasts  between 
lake  and  ocean  traffic.  A  very  large  proportion 
of  lake  vessels  is  owned  by  Americans,  while  the 
reverse  is  true  on  the  ocean. 

Grain  is  handled  in  much  the  same  manner  as 
iron  ore.  Millions  of  bushels  come  into  the  f 
ports  of  Lake  Michigan  and  Lake  Superior,  —  to 
Fort  William,  Duluth,  West  Superior,  Milwau- 
kee, Chicago,  and  minor  ports,  —  and  are  stored 
in  huge  fireproof  buildings  on  the  water  front, 
known  as  grain  elevators.  These  structures  are 
of  all  sizes,  holding  from  thirty  and  forty  thou- 
sand bushels  of  wheat  to  a  million  or  more.  They 
are  equipped  with  machinery  for  scouring,  clean- 
ing, and  drying  the  grain,  and  for  pouring  it 
into  the  vessels.  The  unloading  is  done  either 
by  means  of  an  endless  chain  of  buckets  which 
work  on  a  long  spout  or  "  leg  "  lowered- into 
the  hatch,  or  by  "  pipes  "  or  shafts  from  the  ele- 
vators into  the  fifteen  or  twenty  hatches.  Down 
these  pipes  the  grain  rushes  with  a  buzzing  sound 
at  the  rate  of  one  hundred  and  twenty-five  thou- 
sand bushels  art  hour.  For  the  unloading  process 
the  grain  is  drawn  out  by  suction  through  similar 
pipes,  the  force  supplied  by  powerful  engines 


370         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

which  give  a  pressure  of  several  hundred  pounds 
to  the  square  inch.  In  1907  grain  came  into  the 
lake  ports  which  would  have  made,  when  con- 
verted into  flour,  forty-three  million  barrels  of 
flour.  Reckoning  that  two  hundred  and  fifty 
one-pound  loaves  can  be  made  from  a  barrel,  this 
grain  would  have  supplied  the  world  with  ten 
billion  loaves  of  bread. 

Chicago  and  Buffalo,  the  principal  gateways  of 
entrance  and  exit  for  grain,  have  large  systems  of 
elevators  with  a  capacity  of  millions  of  bushels, 
and  in  the  winter  months  these  are  not  sufficient, 
but  the  ice-bound  vessels  as  they  wait  in  the  har- 
bors of  Chicago  and  Lake  Superior  become  float- 
ing storage  warehouses,  ready  to  sail  east  with 
their  cargoes  the  moment  navigation  is  open. 

These  cargo  freighters,  with  the   huge  barges 
of  similar  construction  that  they  tow  behind  them 
in  lines  of  two  or  three,  are  the  most  character- 
istic vessels  of  the  lakes.     Another  style  of  ship,'  „ 
of  which  much  was  expected  at  the  time  of  its  in-    / 
vention,  was  the  whaleback,  a  long,  cigar-shaped  / 
steel   craft  whose   decks  were   so   low  that  they 
were   constantly   washed    by  the   waves.      These 
boats  were  designed,  as  are  all  lake  boats,  to  have 
the  greatest   possible    empty   space   for  cargo,   a 


{    UNIVERSITY  V 

\  Of 


Shipping  on  the  Lakes  371 

condition  made  possible  by  the  fact  that  in  their 
short  voyages  they  do  not  need  to  carry  large 
stores  of  coal  or  provisions.  The  whaleback  is 
a  blunt-ended  hulk  with  rounded  gunwales,  which 
from  its  appearance  and  from  its  manner  of  root- 
ing and  rolling  about  in  the  waves  has  gained  the 
lake  nickname  of  the  "  pig."  These  vessels  are 
unique  and  picturesque,  but  not  so  successful  as 
the  usual  style  of  freighters.  Moreover,  they 
have  reached  their  maximum  size  and  cannot  be 
improved  or  enlarged  without  change  of  shape. 

The  passenger  steamers  of  the  lakes  are  models' 
of  comfort,  built  more  and  more  on  the  style,  and 
even  approximating  the  size  of,  the  ocean  liners, 
and  after  them  there  remains  only  one  other  type 
of  vessel  that  deserves  mention,  —  the  ice-breaker. 
The  situation  of  the  Great  Lakes  on  the  extreme 
confines  of  the  region  whose  climate  makes  it  fit 
for  the  uses  of  civilized  man  keeps  them  ice- 
bound and  closes  their  commerce  for  five  months 
in  the  year.  Early  in  April  vessel  owners  begin 
to  watch  with  interest  the  straits  of  Mackinac, 
Sault  Ste.  Marie,  and  Detroit.  When  the  chan- 
nel at  Mackinac  shows  water  instead  of  ice,  navi- 
gation of  the  lakes  has  opened.  Then  strong 
ice-breakers  force  their  way  through  the  floating 


372         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

ice  with  a  string  of  vessels  at  their  sterns.  They 
are  powerful  craft  with  a  screw  at  the  bow  as  well 
as  at  the  stern,  the  first  to  suck  the  water  from 
under  the  ice  so  that  the  boat  climbing  upon  it 
may  crush  it  down,  breaking  it  and  throwing  it 
out  of  the  way,  and  the  second  to  propel  the  ves- 
sel through  the  two  or  three  or  even  four  feet  of 
solid  blue  ice  that  have  been  broken  in  this  way. 
This  is  an  American  invention  which  has  been 
copied  in  all  northern  waters.  Russia  sent  one 
of  her  foremost  generals  to  study  its  construction, 
and  it  is  now  in  use  on  her  frozen  lakes  and  seas. 
The  tale  of  lake  shipping  is  a  tale  that  can 
only  be  begun  in  the  limits  of  a  single  chapter. 
There  are  the  car-ferries  of  Detroit,  by  which 
trains  are  carried  across  the  river.  These  are 
now  so  crowded  that  a  tunnel  under  the  river  is 
in  process  of  construction  to  relieve  the  conges- 
tion. There  are  the  stories  of  traffic  at  the  "  Soo  " 
Canal,  through  which  for  six  months  of  the  year 
a  big  steamer  passes  in  every  fifteen  minutes  of 
the  night  and  day,  and  of  the  Detroit  River,  with 
a  record  of  a  vessel  every  thirteen  minutes,  and 
of  an  average  of  two  hundred  tons  of  freight  a 
minute  for  a  season  of  two  hundred  and  thirty 
days.  There  are  the  ship-building  yards  at 


Shipping  on  the  Lakes  373 

Cleveland,  where  thirty-one  steel  freighters  were 
ordered  in  a  single  winter,  and  more  are  turned 
out  every  year.  The  ships  of  the  lakes  are  built 
on  the  lakes,  and  the  shipyards  are  among  the 
busiest  centres  of  all  that  country.  Lastly,  there 
is  the  sad  tale  of  wrecks  and  loss  of  lives,  for  since 
the  first  canoes  were  lost  and  the  Griffon  and  the 
Walk-in- the- Water  went  down,  the  waters  have 
exacted  their  annual  toll,  and  fishing  schooners  and 
seven-thousand-ton  freighters  alike  have  broken 
in  two  or  have  foundered  and  been  dashed  to 
pieces  on  the  rocks,  while  of  the  tale  of  hairbreadth 
escapes  there  is  no  end. 

Lake  shipping  within  the  limits  of  its  own 
waterways  has  developed  in  the  nineteenth  cen- 
tury. In  the  twentieth  is  to  come  the  connect- 
ing of  the  lakes  with  the  Atlantic  by  canal  and 
river,  and  the  story  of  the  twentieth  century  will 
be  of  vessels  going  direct  from  the  ports  of  the 
Great  Lakes  to  the  ports  of  the  Old  World. 
With  this  prophecy  the  tale  would  seem  to  be 
complete. 


CHAPTER   XXVII 

THE    DEVELOPMENT    OF    THE    CITY 

THE  last  sixty  years  of  the  nineteenth 
century  witnessed  on  the  shores  of  the 
Great  Lakes  the  development  of  the 
city.  The  towns  which  we  have  traced  through 
their  early  stages  as  forts,  trading  posts,  and  / 
villages  began  in  1840  to  make  their  appearance 
on  the  census  lists  with  populations  that  could  be 
counted  in  thousands  instead  of  hundreds.  If 
we  reckon  a  population  of  eight  thousand  or  over 
as  the  requisite  number  to  raise  a  town  to  the 
rank  of  city,  Buffalo  with  eighteen  thousand  and 
Detroit  with  nine  thousand  inhabitants  were  in 
1840  the  only  cities  on  the  lakes.  Cleveland 
had  six  thousand,  and  Chicago  and  Milwaukee 
timidly  entered  the  lists  with  records  of  less  than 
five  thousand  and  two  thousand  respectively.  In 
the  proportionate  size  of  cities  in  the  whole 
United  States  these  five  ranged  from  being  six- 
teenth, as  was  Buffalo,  to  being  fifty-fourth,  as 

374 


The  Development  of  the  City          375 

was  Chicago,  and  down  to  Milwaukee,  which  was 
the  seventy-ninth  on  the  list.  In  1906  these  five 
cities  are  among  the  first  twelve  on  the  list,  and 
their  joint  population  is  three  million  six  hun- 
dred thousand,  nearly  one  hundred  times  the  to- 
tal population  of  sixty-five  years  ago.  Figures 
express  this  change  as  well  as  anything  can,  but 
even  figures  can  hardly  suggest  the  wonder  of 
this  unparalleled  development.  It  makes  this 
last  era  of  the  life  of  the  Great  Lakes  one  of 
great  and  unique  interest. 

Immediately  after  1840  this  swift  growth  of^y 
the  city  began.  Within  twenty  years  Detroit  ' 
was  five  times  as  large  as  in  1840,  Buffalo  and 
Cleveland  were  seven  times  as  large,  while  Chi- 
cago and  Milwaukee  had  multiplied  their  num- 
bers by  twenty  and  twenty-five.  Smaller  cities, 
too,  like  Toledo  had  had  a  rapid  increase  in  their 
population.  This  sudden  tide  of  immigration 
and  of  urban  concentration  was  the  natural  result 
of  the  widespread  westward  movement  of  the 
twenty-five  preceding  years  which  had  developed 
the  country  and  created  demands  for  central 
markets,  and  of  the  rise  of  the  great  industries 
described  in  the  preceding  chapters  with  their 
attendants,  the  railroad  and  the  steamboat.  No 


376          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

communities  have  ever  come  into  being  for  more 
immediate  commercial  reasons  than  the  cities  of 
the  Great  Lakes,  and  the  immense  wealth  derived 
from  their  great  industries  has  been  directly 
responsible  for  their  rapid  growth  and  succeeding 
prosperity.  With  this  story  of  the  industrial  side 
of  the  life  of  the  lakes  we  are  all  familiar. 
Each  city  has  necessarily  passed  through  a  stage 
when  it  spent  its  time  and  energy  trying  with 
breathless  haste  to  keep  pace  with  the  outside 
demands  made  upon  it  by  commerce.  Now  that 
stage  has  passed,  at  least  in  so  far  as  this  indus- 
trial side  takes  precedence  over  everything  else 
and  stands  out  preeminent  and  alone  as  the 
characteristic  spirit  of  the  lake  city.  Great 
fortunes  have  been  and  are  being  made,  and 
reasonable  prosperity  has  come  to  thousands  of 
citizens.  The  last  twenty  years  have  seen  these 
cities  broaden  their  interests,  and  stand  out  as 
centres  of  education,  art,  sociology,  politics,  and 
religion,  till  now  they  are  leaders  as  types  of  all- 
round  development,  including  all  these  and  many 
other  lines. 

Each  city  claims  and  has  a  right  to  claim  an 
individual  spirit  and  an  achievement  of  its  own. 
But  to  the  student  of  the  past  and  present  of 


The  Development  of  the  City          377 

these  lake  dwellers  there  comes  the  evidence  of  a 
broader  unity  under  whose  general  aims  and 
purposes,  fostered  by  similar  conditions,  the  local 
successes  have  been  accomplished. 

In  education  these  cities  are  preeminent. 
They  have  been  willing  to  expend  large  sums  on 
the  public  school  systems,  and  have  adapted  high 
educational  principles  to  local  needs  with  an 
independence  that  has  made  for  a  departure  from 
many  old  and  conventional  methods,  but  has 
resulted  almost  always  in  greater  efficiency.  The 
large  proportion  of  foreign-born  children  in  the 
public  schools  has  created  many  problems  and 
brought  the  opportunity  for  great  success  in 
dealing  with  them.  Nor  does  state  and  city 
interest  stop  with  the  usual  public  school  system. 
Michigan,  Wisconsin,  Minnesota,  Ohio,  Indiana, 
and  Illinois  have  strong  state  universities,  for 
whose  support  they  give  lavishly ;  and  beside^V 
them  have  grown  up  three  other  great  univer-  / 
sides,  Chicago  and  Northwestern  in  Chicago,  and 
the  Western  Reserve  in  Cleveland.  There  is  a 
widespread  enthusiasm  for  higher  education,  and 
these  educational  centres  exert  a  great  influence 
both  as  scientific  experiment  stations,  whose  dis- 
coveries are  hailed  with  delight  by  the  farmer  and 


378          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

the  mechanic,  and  as  dominant  centres  of  thought. 
The  universities  and  schools  do  not  wait  for  the 
people  to  come  within  their  walls.  They  go  out 
with  exhibitions  and  instruction  of  all  kinds. 
The  state  legislatures  have  instituted  systems  of 
travelling  and  branch  libraries,  and  education  is 
being  diffused  among  the  people. 

As  a  natural  result  of  high  average  intelligence 
and  of  industrial  conditions  there  has  originated 
in  the  region  bordering  on  the  lakes  a  political 
unrest  which  is  being  worked  out,  under  the 
leadership  of  the  cities,  into  an  encouraging  in- 
dependence of  party  spirit  and  a  striving  for  the 
improvement  of  municipal  and  state  conditions. 
With  the  coming  of  the  city  there  have  arisen 
problems  entirely  new  to  the  administrators,  and 
these  each  city  is  working  out  in  its  own  way. 
Cleveland  by  government  by  commission,  and 
the  other  cities  by  reform  mayors  running  on 
independent  platforms,  and  everywhere  by  in- 
telligent open  discussion  of  such  questions  as 
municipal  ownership  of  street  railways,  control 
of  corporations,  labor  questions,  and  other  matters 
of  public  interest  which  make  the  party  divisions 
based  on  live  social  and  industrial  issues,  not  on 
state  and  national  party  platforms.  The  region 


The  Development  of  the  City          379 

of  the  lower  lakes  is  a  political  storm  centre  for 
the  nation  as  well  as  for  the  immediate  locality, 
and  conditions  there  are  likely  to  have  great  in- 
fluence throughout  the  country. 

Municipal  improvement  has  long  been  the 
watchword  of  all  parties,  and  the  result  has  been 
the  development  of  splendid  water  fronts,  the 
setting  apart  of  land  for  beautiful  park  and  boule- 
vard systems,  the  provision  of  playgrounds  for 
children,  and  the  constant  beautifying  of  the  cities. 
Modern  architecture  has  had  its  chance  here,  and 
has  proved  itself.  The  results  have  made  our 
modern  lake  city  the  admiration  of  all  visitors, 
both  from  this  country  and  from  across  the  water. 

The  two  periods  of  rapid  industrial  growth 
and  of  broadening  self-improvement  each  lake 
city  has  passed  through  in  the  last  sixty  years. 
Into  the  local  details  of  each  we  have  not  space 
to  enter,  although  each  is  an  interesting  story  by  j  * 
itself.  One  city  has  come  to  be  in  size  and  stand- """"""" Jw^O 
ing  the  second  city  of  our  nation,  and  in  passing 
briefly  over  the  steps  of  her  growth  we  can  see 
on  a  large  scale  what  have  been  the  conditions 
which  have  been  met  in  a  smaller  way  by  her 
neighboring  cities. 

With  our  traveller  of  1.840,  we  visited  Chicago 


380         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

and  found  her  a  flourishing  and  rapidly  increasing 
town  of  nearly  five  thousand  inhabitants.  Even 
then  she  was  recognized  as  a  centre  for  the  region 
immediately  surrounding  her.  The  radius  of  her 
influence  has  extended  in  a  way  that  would  have 
seemed  at  that  time  inconceivable.  Her  popula- 
tion has  run  up  to  over  two  millions,  and  in 
wealth  as  well  she  has  come  to  be  the  second 
great  financial  centre  of  the  United  States,  rank- 
ing in  this  as  in  population  next  to  New  York. 
She  began  her  city  life  in  1837  with  $1993  in  her 
treasury.  To  get  money  for  sanitary  drainage, 
for  paving  a  few  streets,  and  purchasing  two  fire 
engines  the  finance  committee  of  the  common 
council  applied  to  the  State  Bank  of  Illinois  for  a 
loan  of  twenty-five  thousand  dollars,  to  be  paid 
back  within  five  years, —  a  request  which  the 
State  Bank  politely  but  curtly  declined  to  grant. 
To-day  her  bank  clearances  amount  to  some 
seven  thousand  million  dollars.  And  so  we 
might  go  on  with  striking  and  astonishing  con- 
trasts. We  have  come  to  take  large  statements 
and  superlative  adjectives  for  granted  about 
Chicago's  size,  wealth,  and  commerce.  Do  we 
realize  that  she  is  the  leading  lake  city  in  the 
other  lines  of  which  we  have  spoken  ? 


The  Development  of  the  City          381 

The  public  school  system  of  Chicago  with  its 
million  of  children  has  been  and  is  being  devel- 
oped along  the  best  modern  pedagogical  princi- 
ples by  men  and  women  who  are  recognized 
leaders  in  the  educational  world.  As  a  centre  for 
higher  education  the  city  takes  high  rank.  Be- 
sides its  technical  schools,  like  the  Armour  In- 
stitute, it  has  two  great  universities,  Chicago  and 
Northwestern.  The  former  began  its  career 
when  John  D.  Rockefeller  decided  to  take  the 
name  and  property  of  the  old  denominational 
university  of  that  name,  sold  at  auction  under 
foreclosure,  and  to  found  a  great  institution.  To 
this  end  he  set  apart  a  large  sum  of  money  and 
secured  as  president  Dr.  William  R.  Harper  of 
Yale.  With  the  remarkable  growth  of  the  uni- 
versity since  it  opened  in  1892  with  seven  hun- 
dred and  two  students,  we  are  all  familiar. 

In  music  and  art  Chicago  is  preeminent,  both 
for  its  high  grade  of  achievement  and  for  the 
widespread  diffusion  of  its  culture  among  its 
citizens.  In  1905  Orchestra  Hall  was  dedicated 
as  a  home  for  music,  and  this  building,  one  of 
the  finest  in  the  world,  had  been  built  by  a  popu- 
lar subscription,  to  which  thousands  of  the  middle 
and  poorer  classes  contributed  their  dollars.  The 


382          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

Chicago  Art  Institute  has  an  attendance  yearly  of 
over  half  a  million  visitors,  a  number  exceeding 
that  of  any  art  museum  in  America,  and  its 
library  is  consulted  annually  by  fifty  thousand 
people.  Such  a  record  is  remarkable,  and  sucrT 
enthusiasm  has  produced  and  is  producing  rec- 
ognized artists.  In  architectural  excellence  the 
story  is  the  same.  In  philanthropy  and  social 
settlement  work  Hull  House,  under  the  leader- 
ship of  Jane  Addams,  is  only  the  most  conspicuous 
of  many  powerful  agencies  for  good. 

For  the  Great  Lakes  to  have  developed,  in  the 
sixty  years  that  have  marked  the  growth  of  the 
big  city  throughout  the  land,  five  of  the  twelve 
largest  cities  of  the  United  States  is  a  remark- 
able showing.  Not  only  have  these  cities  become 
leaders  industrially,  politically,  and  socially,  but 
they  are  constantly  increasing  at  a  rapid  rate  in 
size,  volume  of  commerce,  and  most  of  all  in 
plans  and  forecasts  for  the  future.  From  1880 
to  1890  the  most  rapid  growth  of  the  city  was  in 
this  region.  During  these  ten  years,  while  the 
rate  of  increase  of  the  ocean  ports  ranged  from 
San  Francisco's  fourteen  per  cent  to  New  York's 
thirty-eight  per  cent,  and  that  of  the  river  cities 
from  Cincinnati's  nine  per  cent  to  St.  Louis' 


The  Development  of  the  City          383 

twenty-seven,  no  one  of  the  six  great  ports  of  the 
lakes  fell  below  an  increase  of  thirty-seven  per 
cent,  and  Chicago's  ran  up  to  fifty-four,  and 
Toledo's  to  sixty-one.  This  is  a  striking  exhibi- 
tion of  the  movement  of  population  in  the  wake 
of  commercial  opportunity. 

In  the  Old  World  such  a  group  of  cities  situ- 
ated close  together  on  immense  bodies  of  water 
would  create  an  individual  empire  of  great  wealth 
and  prosperity.,  In  the  United  States  they  are 
recognized  as  a  leading  factor  in  our  prosperity, 
and  a  centre  from  which  not  only  will  great  wealth 
and  natural  resources  be  evolved  and  distributed, 
but  great  leaders,  great  policies,  and  great  ideals 
will  come  forth,  making  the  lake  region  a  force  to 
be  reckoned  with  and  depended  upon  in  the 
future  of  the  Nation. 


A   BRIEF    LIST    OF   BOOKS 

General  Works 

There  is  no  important  general  work  covering  the  entire  field. 
The  best  single  book  is  Charles  Moore's  The  Northwest  under 
Three  Flags,  1635-1796.  B.  A.  Hinsdale's  Old  Northwest 
(2  vols.)  deals  with  this  region,  but  with  especial  emphasis  on 
the  geographical  and  political  phases.  Francis  Parkman  treats 
of  French  and  English  occupation  in  his  Series  of  Historical 
Narratives,  France  and  England  in  North  America,  the  nine  vol- 
umes of  which  will  be  cited  under  their  individual  names. 
Besides  his  Narrative  and  Critical  History  of  America  in  eight 
volumes,  Justin  Winsor  has  three  books  on  the  history  of  this 
region:  Cartier  to  Frontenac,  1534-1700;  The  Mississippi 
Basin;  and  The  Westward  Movement.  Under  this  heading 
should  be  mentioned  the  publications  of  the  various  historical 
societies  of  the  lake  states,  especially  the  Buffalo,  Michigan, 
Wisconsin,  and  Minnesota  collections. 

PART  I.     Discovery  and  Exploration^  1615-1700 

This  period  is  taken  up  in  Parkman' s  Pioneers  of  France  in 
the  New  World,  The  "Jesuits  in  North  America,  La  Salle  and 
the  Discovery  of  the  Great  West,  and  Count  Frontenac  and  New 
France  under  Louis  XI 7.  The  seventy-three  volumes  of  Jesuit 
Relations  and  Allied  Volumes,  edited  by  Reuben  Gold  Thwaites, 
are  the  source  books  for  accounts  of  the  Jesuits.  A  modern 
2C  385 


3 86          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

book  which  covers  this  period  is  C.  W.  Colby's  Canadian 
Types  of  the  Old  Regime,  1608-1698.  E.  B.  O'Callaghan's 
Documentary  History  of  the  State  of  New  York  (4  vols. ),  1 849, 
and  L.  H.  Morgan's  League  of  the  Iroquois  (2  vols.),  1901, 
give  good  accounts  of  the  Indians,  while  the  former  has  reprints 
of  valuable  maps  and  documents. 

The  original  accounts  of  the  voyages  of  the  explorers  are  as 
follows  :  Voyages  of  Samuel  de  Champlain,  translated  by  C.  P. 
Otis,  and  edited  by  E.  F.  Slafter  (3  vols.)  (a  handy  one- 
volume  edition  is  that  of  W.  L.  Grant,  1907);  Relation  of  the 
Discoveries  and  Voyages  of  Cavelier  de  La  S all e  from  1679  to 
1 68 1,  translated  by  M.  B.  Anderson;  and  Louis  Hennepin's 
A  New  Discovery  of  a  Vast  Country  in  America  (2  vols.),  and 
Lahontan's  New  Voyages  to  North  America,  both  reprinted  and 
edited  by  R.  G.  Thwaites.  C.  W.  Butterfield  has  written  a 
History  of  Brute's  Discoveries  and  Explorations,  1610—1626. 
The  story  of  the  pageant  of  Saint  Lusson  comes  to  us  from  his 
Proces-  Verbal  in  the  Wisconsin  Historical  Collections,  xi,  26, 
and  in  Father  Claude  Dablon's  account  in  the  Jesuit  Relations, 
Iv,  105-115. 

PART  II.      The  Struggle  for  Possession,  1700-1832 

For  the  struggle  between  France  and  England  Parkman's 
Half  Century  of  Conflict  (2  vols.),  Montcalm  and  Wolfe 
(2  vols.),  and  Conspiracy  of  Pontiac  (2  vols.)  give  the  best 
connected  account.  S.  Farmer's  History  of  Detroit  and  Michi- 
gan, A.  Hulbert's  The  Niagara  River,  and  other  local  histories 
of  Michigan,  New  York,  Ohio,  and  Niagara,  as  well  as  chroni- 
cles of  the  war,  contribute  to  this  history.  Mr.  C.  M.  Burton 
has  published  a  very  interesting  pamphlet  on  Cadillac's  Village, 
or  Detroit  under  Cadillac,  which  is  the  result  of  his  own  re- 
search in  the  records  of  this  time.  Besides  Parkman's  two- 


A  Brief  List  of  Books  387 

volume  story  of  the  Conspiracy  of  Pontiac,  it  is  well  to  read 
Major  Robert  Rogers'  Journals  of  the  Siege  of  Detroit,  and 
Concise  Account  of  North  America,  176$,  and  also  a  Diary  of 
the  Siege  of  Detroit,  edited  with  other  documents  by  F.  B. 
Hough,  and  The  Gladwin  Manuscripts,  edited  by  Charles 
Moore.  Alexander  Henry  tells  his  own  story  in  Travels  and 
Adventures  in  Canada  and  the  Indian  Territories,  1809. 

For  the  period  of  the  war  between  England  and  America, 
Henry  Adams'  History  of  the  United  States,  1800-1817 
(9vols.),  is  the  authority.  T.  Roosevelt  in  his  The  Winning 
of  the  West,  1777-1807  (5  vols.),  gives  his  fifth  volume  to 
St.  Clair  and  Wayne.  There  are  three  standard  works  on  the 
naval  part  of  the  war,  J.  Barnes'  Naval  Actions  of  the  War  of 
1812,  Roosevelt's  The  Naval  War  of  1812,  and  A.  T. 
Mahan's  Sea  Power  in  its  Relations  to  the  War  of  1812 
(2  vols.).  There  are  many  contemporary  accounts  of  the 
battles  and  defences  of  the  leading  participants,  such  as  The 
Defence  of  Brigadier-General  Hull  Written  by  Himself,  1814. 
Three  leading  documents  of  the  Chicago  massacre  are  the  Nar- 
rative of  the  Massacre  at  Chicago,  1844,  supposed  to  be  the 
Kinzie  account,  The  Chicago  Massacre  in  1812,  which  is  the 
Heald  account,  written  at  a  much  later  date  by  Joseph  Kirkland, 
and  an  anonymous  document  in  the  Michigan  Pioneer  and  His- 
torical Collections,  viii,  648-652.  The  Black  Hawk  War  is 
treated  in  all  histories  of  the  time.  The  material  about  Black 
Hawk  himself  is  gathered  from  B.  Drake's  Life  and  Adventures 
of  Black  Hawk  (jthed.,  1846),  Life  of  Black  Hawk,  Dictated 
by  Himself,  1834,  and  S.  G.  Drake's  Book  of  the  Indians 
(8th  ed.,  1841),  which  has  also  accounts  of  Pontiac  and  Te- 
cumseh.  R.  G.  Thwaites'  How  George  Rogers  Clark  Won 
the  Northwest,  has  an  essay  on  the  Black  Hawk  War,  as  well 
as  other  interesting  essays  on  this  period.  Randall  Parrish's 


388          The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

Historic  Illinois  should  be  mentioned  in  this  connection  as  the 
best  book  of  its  kind  on  this  whole  region,  with  a  clear  account 
of  the  events  that  took  place  in  Illinois  and  a  graphic  picture  of 
pioneer  conditions. 

The  biographies  of  Cass  and  Wayne  are  valuable.  The  two 
contemporary  books  on  Cass  are  W.  L.  G.  Smith's  .  The  Life 
and  Times  of  Lewis  Cass,  and  W.  T.  Young's  Life  and  Public 
Services  of  Lewis  Cass.  A.  C.  McLaughlin  has  written  a  good 
biography  with  the  title,  Lewis  Casst  for  the  American  States- 
man Series.  John  R.  Spears  is  the  author  of  a  biography  of 
Anthony  Wayne,  1903. 

PART  III.      Occupation  and  Development 

The  bibliography  of  this  section  would  include  all  that  has 
come  before,  and  much  from  pamphlets,  historical  society  publi- 
cations, local  histories,  and  records  of  anniversary  celebrations, 
which  would  make  too  long  a  list  of  sources.  There  are  no 
general  works  on  this  phase  of  the  life  of  the  Great  Lakes. 
Archer  B.  Hulbert's  Historic  Highways  of  America  (16  vols.) 
contains  much  that  is  of  interest  about  roads  to  the  lakes,  espe- 
cially in  volumes  I,  2,  7,  8,  11,  12,  and  14.  J.  F.  Rhodes' 
History  of  the  United  States  from  the  Compromise  of  1850 
(7  vols.)  has  in  its  earlier  volumes  valuable  references  and 
accounts  of  happenings  in  its  period.  In  general,  however,  one 
must  turn  to  the  local  records  and  state  histories. 

L.  P.  Powell  has  gathered  and  edited  two  volumes  entitled 
Historic  Towns  of  the  Middle  States,  and  Historic  Towns  of 
the  Western  States.  Seven  suggestive  books  are:  Parker's 
Rochester,  A  Story  Historical,  and  H.  O'Reilly's  Sketches  of 
Rochester;  The  Niagara  Book,  by  W.  D.  Howells,  N.  S. 
Shaler,  and  others,  and  F.  H.  Severance's  Old  Trails  on  the 
Niagara  Frontier;  Urann's  Centennial  History  of  Cleveland; 


A  Brief  List  of  Books  389 

W.  P.  Strickland's  Old  Mackinaw,  1860;  and  A.  T.  Andreas' 
History  of  Chicago  (3  vols.). 

The  Buffalo  Historical  Collections  have  much  material  about 
the  Erie  Canal,  as  has  W.  W.  Campbell's  Life  and  Writings 
of  De  Witt  Clinton.  J.  L.  Barton's  Commerce  of  the  Lakes  and 
the  Erie  Canal,  William  Norris'  Map  of  the  Railroads  and 
Canals  in  the  United  States  and  Canada,  August,  1834,  Early 
Chicago  Railroads,  1838,  and  W.  K.  Ackerman's  Early 
Illinois  Railroads,  in  Fergus  Historical  Series,  No.  23,  pp.  3— 
62,  and  a  little  book,  Instructions  for  Running  Railroads,  1862, 
are  all  good  for  the  years  of  rapid  development  about  the  lakes. 
Two  other  books  on  railroads  should  be  included :  F.  H. 
Spearman's  The  Strategy  of  Great  Railroads  and  Mott's 
Between  Ocean  and  Lakes. 

There  are  two  contemporary  lives  of  Stephen  A.  Douglas, 
one  by  J.  W.  Sheahan,  published  in  1860  for  campaign  pur- 
poses, and  another,  The  Life  and  Speeches  of  Stephen  A. 
Douglas,  by  a  "  Member  of  the  Western  Bar."  Allen  Johnson 
has  recently  brought  out  a  valuable  life  of  this  Illinois  statesman. 
Nicolay  and  Hay's  Abraham  Lincoln,  A  History  (10  vols.)  is 
the  standard  work  on  Lincoln.  J.  W.  Headley  has  written  on 
Confederate  Operations  in  Canada  and  New  York,  giving  an 
intimate  account  of  events  in  which  he  played  an  active  part. 
F.  J.  Turner  is  the  authority  on  the  fur  trade,  which  he  has 
described  in  The  Character  and  Influence  of  the  Indian  Trade 
in  Wisconsin,  Johns  Hopkins  Studies,  Vol.  IX. 

Gazetteers  and  Travels 

In  the  numerous  guide-books  and  records  of  travellers  of  the 
past  one  hundred  and  twenty-five  years  is  written  most  vividly 
the  story  of  the  Great  Lakes.  Each  one  of  those  we  mention 
contributes  something  to  the  account  of  the  region. 


j  90         The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

Travels.  J.  Carver's  Travels  through  the  Interior  Parts  of 
North  America  in  1766,  1767,  1768;  I.  Weld's  Travels, 
1795-1797  ;  J.  Harriott's  Struggles  through  Life,  etc.,  1796, 
11,97-149;  Sutcliff's  Travels,  1804,  1805,  1806;  John 
Melish's  Travels  in  the  United  States  in  1 806  and  1807  and 
1809,  1810,  1811  (2  vols. );  Schultz'  Travels  on  an  Inland 
Voyage,  1 807  and  1 808  ;  F.  Hall's  Travels  in  1 8 1 6  and  1817; 
J.  M.  Duncan's  Travels,  ii,  3-120;  Views  of  Society  and 
Manners  in  America,  1 8 1 8-1 820,  pp.  I  25-1  8  I  ;  H.  R.  School- 
craft's  Narrative  Journal  of  Travels  from  Detroit  Northwest  in 
1820,  which  gives  an  official  account  of  the  Cass  expedition; 
William  Dalton's  Travels,  1821  ;  P.  Stznsbury's  Pedestrian  Tour 
in  1821,  giving  an  account  of  a  trip  from  Albany  to  Niagara ; 
C.  H.  Wilson's  The  Wanderer  in  America,  1823;  T.  L. 
McKenney's  Sketches  of  a  Tour  to  the  Lakes,  which  is  very 
valuable;  Basil  Hall's  Travels  in  North  America  in  1827 
and  1828,  treating  in  vol.  i  of  this  region;  Anne  Royall's 
Black  Book,  vol.  i;  John  Fowler's  Journal  of  a  Tour  in  the 
State  of  New  York  in  1830-1831.  We  come  now  to  a  set 
of  travels  which  tell  of  the  western  lakes  in  particular  and  give  a 
picture  of  their  towns:  A  Winter  in  the  West,  by  a  New 
Tor  her  (2  vols.),  1835;  Life  on  the  Lakes,  telling  of  a  Lake 
Superior  trip  in  1836  by  the  author  of  "Legends  of  a  Log 
Cabin";  Bela  Hubbard's  Memorials  of  Half  a  Century,  also 
of  a  voyage  to  Lake  Superior.  J.  L.  Peyton's  Over  the  Alle- 
ghanies  and  Across  the  Prairies,  1848,  and  Captain  Mac- 
kinnon's  Atlantic  and  Trans- Atlantic  Sketches,  i,  141-233, 
give  vivid  pictures  of  lake  travel.  Lillian  Foster  was  in  Chicago 
in  1860,  and  tells  in  Wayside  Glimpses,pp.  200-224,  her  impres- 
sions of  Douglas  and  the  political  situation.  Margaret  Fuller 
spent  a  Summer  on  the  Lakes  in  1 843  ;  Charles  Dickens  went 
to  Niagara,  which  he  describes  in  his  American  Notes,  1842, 


A  Brief  List  of  Books  391 

and  Harriet  Martineau  wrote  a  Retrospect  of  Western  Travel 
(3  vols.),  1838,  in  which  she  devotes  seventy  pages  of  the  first 
volume  to  a  trip  from  Albany  to  Niagara.  Two  accounts  of 
travel  in  Minnesota  are  E.  S.  Seymour's  Sketches  of  Minnesota, 
1850,  and  C.  C.  Andrews'  Minnesota  and  Dacotah,  1857. 

Gazetteers  and  Guides  (arranged  alphabetically).  S.  R. 
Brown's  The  Western  Gazetteer,  1817;  E.  Dana's  Description 
of  the  Bounty  Lands  of  Illinois  in  1819,  and  Geographical 
Sketches  on  the  Western  Country,  1819;  William  Darby's  Emi- 
grants' Guide  to  the  Western  and  Southwestern  States  and  Ter- 
ritories, 1818;  G.  M.  Davison's  The  Fashionable  Tour,  with 
several  successive  editions  under  the  title,  The  Traveller's  Guide, 
1830-1840;  J.  DisturnelPs  The  Western  Traveller,  1844,  and 
A  Trip  through  the  Lakes  of  North  America,  1857;  T. 
Dwight's  The  Northern  Traveller;  A.  D.  Jones'  Illinois  and 
the  West,  1838,  which  is  especially  good  on  pioneer  conditions; 
John  Melish's  Geographical  Description  of  the  United  States, 
Information  and  Advice  to  Emigrantst  and  Traveller1 s  Direc- 
tory, 1815-1826;  S.  A.  Mitchell's  Illinois  in  1837;  J.  M. 
Peck's  Gazetteer  of  Illinois,  Guide  for  Emigrants,  and  New 
Guide  for  Emigrants  to  the  West,  1831-1848;  J.  C.  Smith's 
The  Western  Tourist,  1840,  and  Steele's  Western  Guide-Books, 
1830-1840;  H.  Spofford's  Pocket  Guide  of  the  State  of  New 
York,  1 824  ;  H.  S.  Tanner's  The  American  Traveller  (8th  ed., 
1842);  and  George  Temple's  The  American  Tourist's  Pocket 
Companion,  1812. 


INDEX 


Adrian,  276,  285. 

Albany,  91,  102,  228,  232,  237,  242, 

248,  252,  256,  259. 
Allouez,  Father  Claude,  41 ;  address 

to  Indians,  45-47. 
American  Fur  Company,  338. 
Anderson,  Robert,  207. 
Andre,  Father  Louis,  41. 
Astor,  John  Jacob,  338,  357. 

Barclay,  Commodore,  in  command 
of  British  fleet  on  Lake  Erie,  182, 
183;  defeated  by  Perry,  184-187. 

Battles,  Niagara,  108— in;  Bloody 
Run,  129,  130;  Fallen  Timbers, 
1 60,  161;  Tippecanoe,  166; 
River  Raisin,  180,  181;  Lake 
Erie,  183-187;  The  Thames,  188, 
189;  Chippewa  Creek,  189; 
Lundy's  Lane,  189;  Wisconsin 
Heights,  210,  211;  Bad  Axe, 
211. 

Beall,  John  Yates,  Confederate 
agent  on  the  lakes,  322-326,  328, 

329- 

Bibliography,  385-391. 

Black  Hawk,  appearance  and  early 
career,  201-203;  h*3  war>  205~ 
212;  his  eastern  trip,  212-214. 

Black  Rock,  181,  182,  254. 

Boone,  Daniel,  at  Detroit,  152. 

Brebeuf,  Father  Jean,  Jesuit  mis- 
sionary to  Hurons,  25-37 ;  founder 
of  mission,  25;  life  among  In- 
dians, 25-33  >  killed  by  Iroquois, 

37- 

Brock,  Gen.  Isaac,  captures  De- 
troit for  British,  168-172. 

Brule,  Etienne,  first  white  man  to 
see  Lake  Huron,  10,  14. 

Buffalo,  founded,  220,  221;  in  1811, 
246,  247 ;  terminus  of  Erie  Canal, 


254—256,  260;  in  1840,  266-269; 
lumber  market,  345,  346;  first 
steamboat  launched  at,  360; 
grain  elevators,  370;  rapid 
growth,  374,  375. 
Buffalo  roads,  229,  230. 

Cadillac,  La  Mothe,  founder  of  De- 
troit, 88-98;  character,  88;  at 
Mackinac,  88;  at  Detroit,  89- 
98. 

Cadillac,  Madame,  96. 

Campbell,  Capt.,  124,  126. 

Camp  Douglas,  319-322,  326. 

Canals,  Welland,  5,  283;  Henne- 
pin,  6;  Rock  River,  224;  Penn- 
sylvania and  Erie,  272,  284;  Ohio 
and  Erie,  273,  283,  284;  Wabash 
and  Erie,  276,  284;  Miami,  284; 
Erie,  see  under  Erie;  "Soo,"  see 
under  Sault  Ste.  Marie. 

Cass,  Lewis,  in  War  of  1812,  170; 
governor  of  Michigan  territory, 
191-200;  early  life,  192;  manage- 
ment of  the  territory,  193-196; 
dealings  with  Indians,  196-200; 
at  Duluth,  200,  224,  225. 

Champlain,  Samuel  de,  on  Lake 
Huron,  10,  14;  early  career,  12, 
13;  among  the  Hurons,  14-23; 
his  writings,  23,  24. 

Chicago,  military  post,  166;  mas- 
sacre at,  172-177;  under  Gov- 
ernor Cass,  193,  198,  200;  town 
begun,  222,  223;  in  1840,  266, 
275-279;  Lincoln  and  Douglas 
in,  299-316;  in  Civil  War,  318- 
322,  327-329;  first  steamboat 
to,  361 ;  grain  elevators,  369,  370; 
the  modern  city,  379-383;  see 
also  Chicago  River,  and  Fort 
Dearborn. 


393 


394 


Index 


Chicago  University,  319,  381. 

Cleveland,  founded,  164,  165,  219, 
220;  in  1840,  272,  273;  coming 
of  the  first  train,  289-291 ;  com- 
merce, 291,  350,  351 ;  shipyards, 
372,  373;  rapid  growth,  374,  375, 

377,  378. 

Cleveland,  Moses,  164,  219. 
Clinton,    De    Witt,    and    the    Erie 

Canal,  237,  238,  251,  254-260. 
Confederate  operations  on  the  lakes, 

3 x 7-329- 

Connecticut,  land  cession,  219. 
Conventions,   National   Republican 

of  1860,  300,  311-314;    National 

Democratic  of  1864,  321,  322. 
Coureurs  de  bois,  41,  47,  107,  333, 

334- 

Dablon,  Father  Claude,  41. 

Dalyell,  Capt.,  at  siege  of  Detroit, 
128,  129;  killed,  130. 

Davis,  Jefferson,  in  Black  Hawk 
War,  207;  sends  commissioners 
to  Canada,  317. 

Davison,  Gideon,  his  Travellers' 
Guides,  267-269. 

Denonville,  governor  of  New 
France,  87,  104. 

Detroit,  founded  by  French,  87—100; 
taken  by  British,  116;  blockaded 
by  Pontiac,  118-134;  in  1776, 
151—153;  an  American  post,  154, 
163,  164;  taken  by  British,  166- 
172;  under  Gov.  Cass,  194,  195; 
fire  at,  221;  in  1840,  274,  275; 
terminus  of  Michigan  Central, 
288;  rapid  growth,  374,  375. 

Detroit  River,  visited  by  La  Salle, 
62,  63;  first  recorded  passage 
of,  63;  importance  of,  88-91; 
beauty  of,  91-93;  military  opera- 
tions on,  125-131,  167-170,  187, 
*9°t  323»  325>  commerce  of, 
371-373- 

Douglas,  Stephen  A.,  299-316; 
early  career,  302-306;  debates 
with  Lincoln,  300,  309-311; 
Senator,  305,  311,  31 4,  315;  sup- 


porter    of      Lincoln,      314-316; 

death,  316. 

Druilletes,  Gabriel,  41. 
Du    Luth,    Daniel     G.,    224,    334, 

335- 
Duluth,  Indian  trading  station,  224, 

225,  334;    becomes  a  town,  225; 

commerce  of,  344,  354,  369. 
Dunkirk,    railroad    celebration    at, 

291-293. 

Erie,  Lake,  discovered  and  explored, 
61,  63;  forts  on,  104,  108,  109, 
118,  125,  164;  in  War  of  1812, 
165-168,  179-190;  settlements 
on,  219,  220;  roads,  canals,  and 
railroads  to,  232-241,  242,  251- 
265,  283-297;  travel  on,  268- 
274;  in  Civil  War,  322-326; 
commerce  of,  343,  345,  360. 

Erie,  Penn.,  in  1840,  268,  272;  rail- 
road war,  294-298;  underground 
railroad  station,  302;  see  also 
Presque  Isle  under  Forts. 

Erie  Canal,  5,  195,  221,  226,  237, 
238,  251-265;  building  of,  251- 
254;  ceremony  of  opening,  254— 
260;  travel  on,  261-263;  en~ 
larged,  263-265;  271,  283. 

Forts,  Frontenac,  52,  61,  105,  218; 
Duquesne,  104;  Le  Bceuf,  104, 
1 06,  109;  Sandusky,  104,  125, 
219;  Venango,  104,  106,  291; 
Presque  Isle,  104,  106,  109,  118, 
125,  164,  219;  Washington,  158; 
Recovery,  158;  Defiance,  159; 
Harrison,  166;  Dearborn,  166, 
172-177;  Wayne,  166,  174,  276; 
Maiden,  167-170,  180,  183,  187, 
1 88;  William,  338-341. 

Franklin,  Benjamin,  makes  Great 
Lakes  U.S.  boundary,  347. 

Frenchtown,  Hull  at,  167;  Ameri- 
can defeat  at,  179-181. 

Frontenac,  governor  of  New  France, 
50,  59,  67;  recalled,  73;  returns, 
87;  his  plan  to  occupy  Great 
Lakes,  87,  88;  death,  87. 


Index 


395 


Fuller,  Margaret,  trip  to  the  lakes, 
278-282. 

Fur  trade,  carried  on  by  French  and 
English,  39,  51,  52,  66-68,  88, 
89,  101,  102,  135,  145;  leading 
interest  on  the  lakes,  330-342; 
under  the  French,  331-335; 
under  the  British,  335-342;  under 
the  Americans,  155,  165,  337,  338, 
34i,  347- 

Genesee  Turnpike,  233. 

Georgian  Bay,  10,  12,  14,  25,  28, 
148,  218. 

Gladwin,  Major,  in  command  at 
Detroit,  119;  blockaded  by  Pon- 
tiac,  119-133;  saves  Detroit,  133. 

Grain,    handled   by  lake   ports,    6, 

369,  37°- 

Greeley,  Horace,  297. 
Green  Bay,  76,  333,  337. 
Griffon,  see  under  Ships. 
Groseillers,  39. 

Hamilton,  Gen.,  at  Detroit,  151- 
153;  captured  by  Clark,  153. 

Harmar,  Gen.,  unsuccessful  ex- 
pedition against  Indians,  156, 
161,  174. 

Harriott,  John,  journey  to  Lake 
Erie,  242-246. 

Harrison,  Gen.  W.  H.,  at  Tippe- 
canoe,  166;  Lake  Erie  expedi- 
tion, 179,  1 80;  battle  of  the 
Thames,  187-189. 

Harvey,  C.  T.,  designer  and  builder 
of  "Soo"  Canal,  362-364. 

Hawley,  Jesse,  and  Erie  Canal,  237. 

Heald,  Capt.,  in  command  at  Fort 
Dearborn,  172-177;  escapes  mas- 
sacre, 176,  177. 

Hennepin,  Father  Louis,  compan- 
ion of  La  Salle,  51;  writes  of 
Niagara,  52,  53;  and.  of  the 
voyage,  58,  59;  names  Lake  St. 
Clair,  63. 

Henry,  Alexander,  adventures  at 
Mackinac,  135—150;  copper  min- 
ing, 347- 


Hines,  Capt.,  Confederate  agent, 
321,  322. 

Hotels,  American,  and  Franklin, 
in  Cleveland,  273;  Lake  House, 
in  Chicago,  277,  278;  Tremont 
House,  in  Chicago,  307,  308, 
314,  316. 

Hull,  Gen.,  in  War  of  1812,  166- 
172;  surrenders  Detroit,  171. 

Huron,  Lake,  discovered  and  ex- 
plored, 10-14,  25-28,  37,  65,  71, 
88,  150,  218;  travel  on,  282; 
commerce  of,  336,  337,  360,  372. 

Illinois,  part  of  Northwest  Territory, 
155;  becomes  a  state,  193;  Black 
Hawk  War  in,  201-214;  in  1840, 
266,  267,  269,  270;  in  1850-1860, 
299,  300,  302,  304,  305;  in  Civil 
War,  318. 

Indiana,  part  of  Northwest  Terri- 
tory, 155,  165;  becomes  a  terri- 
tory, 191;  becomes  a  state,  193; 
in  1840,  266,  267;  in  Civil  War, 

318- 

Indian  treaties,  with  La  Salle,  56; 
with  La  Barre,  76-83;  with  Le 
Moyne,  102;  with  Johnson,  131— 
J33»  *45,  J49;  with  Wayne 
(Treaty  of  Greenville),  162,  164, 
219,  222;  with  Cass,  198-200, 
224,  225;  with  U.  S.  government, 
202. 

Indian  tribes,  Iroquois  or  Five  Na- 
tions, location  and  organization, 
ii,  12,  232;  their  relations  to  the 
French,  17-22,  36-38,  54,  60, 
74-84;  at  Niagara,  102,  217; 
Hurons,  location,  12-16;  at  war 
with  Iroquois,  16-23,  3^,  375 
Algonquins,  12,  114;  Neutral 
Nation,  33;  Ojibways,  114; 
Ottawas,  114,  1 20,  144,  145; 
Illinois,  114,  134;  Chippewas, 
138-145;  Sauk  and  Fox,  202- 
214.  For  Mohawks,  Oneidas, 
Onondagas,  Cayugas,  Senecas, 
see  under  Iroquois. 

Iroquois  Trail,  231,  232,  251. 


396 


Index 


Jesuits,  missions  to  Hurons,  25-38; 
to  Iroquois,  38;  at  Sault  Ste. 
Marie,  34,  35,  39;  at  La  Pointe, 
39,  41 ;  at  Manitoulin  Island,  41. 

Jogues,  Father  Isaac,  Jesuit  mis- 
sionary, among  Hurons,  32,  34; 
visits  and  names  Sault  Ste.  Marie, 
35;  captured  and  killed  by 
Iroquois,  35,  36. 

Johnson,  Sir  William,  captures 
Niagara,  106— in;  Indian  con- 
ferences, 131,  132,  133,  146-149. 

Johnston,  Albert,  207. 

Joncaire,  101,  108. 

La  Barre,  Gen.  Le  Febvre  de,  73— 
84;  expedition  against  Iroquois, 
74-84. 

La  Motte,  companion  of  La  Salle, 
53-56. 

La  Pointe,  39,  41. 

La  Salle,  Robert  Cavelier,  Sieur 
de,  early  career,  49—5 1 ;  builds 
the  Griffon,  56—60;  on  Lakes 
Erie,  Huron,  and  Michigan,  61— 

7i- 

Le  Caron,  Father  Joseph,  10,  15,  16. 
Le  Moyne,  Charles  (ist),  103. 
Le  Moyne,  Charles  (ad),  with  La 

Barre,  75,  80,  82,  104. 
Le    Moyne,    Charles    (3d),    builds 

Fort  Niagara,  102-104. 
Le  Moyne,  Father,  38. 
Lewiston,  54,  102,  232,  238. 
Lincoln,  Abraham,  in  Black  Hawk 

War,  206;   debates  with  Douglas, 

300,    302,    308-311;    nominated 

for  presidency,  311-314. 
Lockport,  253,  256,  257,  264. 
Logan,  Gen.  John  A.,  3,  316. 
Lumber,    forest    distribution,    342, 

343;  industry,  343-347. 

McDougall,  Lieut.,  at  Detroit,  124, 
126. 

Mackinac  (called  Michilimackinac, 
Mackinaw),  trading  post,  66,  67, 
88,  218,  223,  224,  281;  North- 
west Fur  Company  and  Ameri- 


can Fur  Company  station,  335- 
338,  357;  lumber  region,  344;  fort 
at,  118,  135-150,  166,  168,  169, 
177,  224,  268. 

Manitoulin  Island,  41,  281. 

Marquette,  42,  218. 

Massachusetts  land  cession,  220. 

Melish,  John,  journey  in  western 
New  York,  246—248. 

Menard,  Father,  on  Lake  Superior, 
39- 

Michigan,  part  of  Northwest  Terri- 
tory, 155;  a  separate  territory 
under  Cass,  191-196;  becomes  a 
state,  196;  in  1840,  266,  267; 
railroads,  284-288;  lumber  trade, 
343-345;  mineral  wealth,  347- 

351- 

Michigan,  Lake,  discovered  and 
explored,  35,  39,  40,  49,  67-71; 
forts  on,  70,  1 1 8,  119,  166,  172- 
178;  settlement  on,  198,  200,  222, 
223;  travel  on,  279-281;  com- 
merce of,  337,  357,  361,  369,  370. 

Michigan  City,  in  1840,  266,  276; 
underground  railroad  station,  302. 

Milwaukee,  founded,  223,  224;  in 
1840,  266,  279,  280;  fur  trade  of, 
337;  port  for  grain,  369;  rapid 
growth,  374,  375. 

Minerals,  copper,  4,  8,  347,  348; 
iron,  4,  8,  348-354,  367~369J 
lead,  201,  202. 

Minnesota,  lumber  trade,  343,  344, 
346;  mineral  wealth,  352-354. 

New  York,  home  of  Iroquois  tribes, 
ii,  12;  Indian  trails,  231,  232; 
turnpikes,  232—236,  242-250; 
canals,  237,  250-265;  railroads, 
238-241,  291—298. 

Niagara,  discovered,  52-61 ;  held 
by  French,  101-105;  taken  by 
English,  105-112;  Indian  con- 
vention at,  132,  149;  in  War  of 
1812,  181,  182,  189. 

Niagara  Falls,  location,  5 ;  seen  by 
Hennepin,  52,  53;  description  of, 
53 ;  visited,  246. 


Index 


397 


Niagara,  Fort,  built,  101-105;  cap- 
tured by  British,  105-113;  centre 
of  British  influence,  153. 

Niagara  River,  key  to  the  lakes,  54- 
60;  in  War  of  1812,  181,  182,  189. 

Nicolet,  35,  331. 

Ni pissing,  Lake,  13,  27,  34,  218. 

Northwestern  Fur  Company,  224, 
335,  338-341. 

Ohio,  part  of  Northwest  Territory, 
155;  becomes  a  state,  191;  in 
1840,  266,  267;  canals,  283,  284; 
railroads,  284—291 ;  underground 
railroad,  301,  302;  in  Civil  War, 
318. 

Onondaga,  see  Syracuse. 

Ontario,  Lake,  discovered  and  ex- 
plored, 17,  22,  52,  56,  75;  forts 
on,  52,  61,  100— 112,  189,  218; 
travel  on,  242 ;  commerce  of,  336. 

Ordinance  of  1787,  155,  191. 

Oswego,  trading  post,  102,  105, 
333;  Johnson  at,  132,  133;  fort, 
219;  village,  220,  221. 

Pennsylvania,  canals,  284;  rail- 
roads, 291-297;  299,302,368. 

Perrot,  Nicholas,  201. 

Perry,  Oliver  Hazard,  early  life, 
181 ;  in  charge  of  Lake  Erie 
fleet,  181-182;  battle  of  Lake 
Erie,  183-187,  190. 

Pontiac,  meets  Rogers,  113;  char- 
acter and  early  career,  113—116; 
blockades  Detroit,  119-131;  later 
life  and  death,  133. 

Pouchot,  Capt.,  French  officer  at 
Niagara,  105;  besieged  by  Eng- 
lish, 106-111;  surrenders,  in. 

Prideaux,  Gen.,  killed  at  Niagara, 
105,  106. 

Proctor,  Gen.  Henry,  at  Maiden, 
180,  187;  defeated,  188,  189. 

Radisson,  39. 

Railroads,  Mohawk  and  Hudson, 
238,  240;  New  York  Central, 
241,  291,  298;  Michigan  Central, 


284,  287,  288;  Kalamazoo  and 
Erie,  285,  286;  Michigan  South- 
ern, 285 ;  Cleveland,  Columbus, 
and  Cincinnati,  288-291 ;  New 
York  and  Erie,  291-298;  Illi- 
nois Central,  305,  306;  Iron 
Mountain  Road,  351;  see  also 
under  Roads. 

Rivers,  Chicago,  70,  218,  222; 
Cuyahoga,  113,  219;  Detroit,  see 
under  Detroit  River;  Fox- Wis- 
consin, 98,  218;  Genesee,  56, 
220,  233,  235,  246,  252,  257; 
Illinois,  66,  71,  106;  Maumee, 
133,  J59.  r78,  179,  2l8,  276,  284; 
Milwaukee,  223;  Mississippi, 

12,  49,    104,    154,    155,    201-203, 
211,  218,  225,  299;  Mohawk,  232, 
237,  246,  252,  259,  264;   Niagara, 
see  under  Niagara  River;    Ohio, 
49,  104,  154,  158,  165,  228,  284, 
302;    Oswego,  102;    Ottawa,  10, 

13,  27,  51,  90,  154,  218;    Raisin, 
179-181;     Rock,     201-208,    212; 
Sandusky,    183,    187;    St.   Croix, 
225,  344;    St.  Joseph's,  70,   119, 
161,    218,    275;     St.    Lawrence, 
12,  13,  74,  84,  96,  104,  147,  236; 
Thames,  188-190;   Wabash,  177, 
218;    Wisconsin,    201,    202,    210, 

211,    212. 

Roads,  buffalo  roads,  229,  230; 
Indian  trails,  230-232;  turn- 
pikes, 232-236,  247-250;  log- 
roads,  243;  railroads,  238-241, 
283-298,  305,  344,  351,  353. 

Rochester,  founded,  220;  turnpike 
to,  235,  236;  on  Erie  Canal,  252; 
canal  celebration  at,  257,  258. 

Rochester,  Nathaniel,  220,  235. 

Rogers,  Major  Robert,  meets  Pon- 
tiac, 113;  at  Detroit,  116,  128, 
129. 

Rome,  232,  258,  259. 

Saginaw,  198,  344. 

St.  Clair,  Gen.,  his  defeat,  156-159, 

174. 
St.  Clair,  Lake,  named,  63,  64. 


398 


Index 


Saint  Lusson,  Daumont  de,  his  cere- 
mony at  Sault  Ste.  Marie,  40-48. 

Sandusky,  in  1840,  268,  272,  273; 
Underground  Railroad  station, 
302;  in  Civil  War,  322-325,  328; 
see  also  under  Forts. 

Sandwich,  American  army  at,  168, 
169;  evacuated  by  British,  187, 
1 88. 

Sault  Ste.  Marie,  discovered,  34,  35, 
39;  Saint  Lusson  at,  39—48; 
Henry  at,  137,  145-148;  Cass  at, 
199;  Margaret  Fuller  at,  282; 
"Soo"  Canal  built,  7,  8,  351, 
362-365 ;  commerce  of,  8,  364,  372. 

Schenectady,  232,  238,  240,  268. 

Scott,  Gen.  Winfield,  in  Black  Hawk 
War,  207,  212. 

Ships,  kinds  of,  bateau,  127,  129, 
358.  359J  canal  b°at,  255-259, 
261—264;  canoe,  356-359;  pi- 
rogue, 359;  sailing  vessel,  359, 
360,  365;  steamboats,  268, 
269,  279,  360-362,  371;  steel 
freighters,  365-370;  whalebacks, 
370,  371;  ice-breakers,  371,  3 72 ; 
Grifon,  first  sailing  vessel  on  the 
lakes,  51-69;  built  by  La  Salle, 
51-60;  on  the  lakes,  6 1 -68;  lost, 
69,  359,  3735  Beaver,  at  Detroit, 
120,  127,  359;  Gladwin,  at  De- 
troit, 120,  126,  127,  130,  359; 
ships  in  battle  of  Lake  Erie,  183- 
187;  on  Erie  Canal,  255-259;  in 
Civil  War,  322-326,  329;  Walk-in- 
the-Water,  first  steamboat  on  the 
lakes,  360,  361,  373. 

Sons  of  Liberty,  318-322,  328. 

Stage  wagons,  234,  236,  243-245, 
247,  248. 

Superior,  Indian  trading  station, 
224,  225;  became  a  town,  225; 
commerce  of,  344,  369. 

Superior,  Lake,  discovered  and  ex- 
plored, 39,  198-200,  224;  settle- 
ment on,  225;  commerce  of, 
336-34i,  344,  347-354,  357,  360- 
37°- 

Syracuse  (Onondaga),  232,  252,  264. 


Taylor,  Col.  Zachary,  207. 

Tecumseh,  leads  Indian  uprising, 
165,  1 66;  with  the  British,  169, 
170,  187-189;  killed,  189. 

Toledo,  in  1840,  266,  276;  terminus 
of  canal  and  railroad,  284,  287; 
rapid  growth,  375,  383. 

Tolls,  table  of,  235,  236. 

Tonty,  companion  of  La  Salle,  56, 
70. 

Tonty,  Madame,  96. 

Toronto,  148,  219. 

Tower,  Charlemagne,  opens  iron 
mines,  352,  354. 

Travel,  bibliography,  389-391 ;  to 
Lake  Erie,  in  1796,  242-246;  in 
1811,  246-250;  on  Erie  Canal, 
261-263;  on  the  Great  Lakes  in 
1840,  266-282. 

Travellers,  John  Harriott,  242- 
246;  John  Melish,  246-248;  an 
Englishwoman,  248,  249;  Anne 
Roy  all,  261-263;  Margaret  Ful- 
ler, 278-282. 

Treaties,  treaty  of  Paris,  1782,  153, 
i54;  Jay's  treaty,  1796,  163; 
treaty  of  Ghent,  1814,  190;  see 
also  Indian  treaties. 

Turnpikes,  see  under  Roads. 

Two  Harbors,  353,  354. 

Underground  Railroad,  301,  302. 
Utica  (Fort  Schuyler),  232,  233,  238, 
245,  248,  260,  262. 

Walk-in-the-Water,  see  under  Ships. 

Wayne,  Anthony,  Indian  campaign, 
156-164;  makes  treaty  of  Green- 
ville, 162;  death,  164. 

Wells,  William,  at  Fort  Dearborn 
massacre,  174-177. 

Wigwam,  Republican,  311-315. 

Wisconsin,  part  of  Northwest 
Territory,  155;  called  Huron 
district,  193;  Black  Hawk 
War  in,  201,  210-212;  in  1840, 
266,  267;  lumber  trade,  343- 
346;  mineral  wealth,  351,  352, 
354- 


7  04 

Stories  from  American  History 


Yankee  Ships  and  Yankee  Sailors 

By  JAMES  BARNES 

Tales  of  1812,  by  the  author  of  "  Drake  and  his  Yeomen,"  "  For  King 
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derness road.  In  telling  his  story  Mr.  Bruce  touches  on  such  matters 
as  the  economic  and  social  factors  influencing  the  movement  across 
the  mountains,  and  the  significance  of  that  movement  with  relation  to 
the  growth  of  revolutionary  sentiment  in  the  American  colonies,  etc. 
To  be  illustrated. 

In  preparation 

The  Story  of  the  Great  Lakes 

By  EDWARD  CHANNING  and  MARION  F.  LANSING 

The  Professor  of  American  History  in  Harvard  University,  author  of 
a  number  of  volumes  on  the  History  of  the  United  States,  has  found 
an  immense  amount  of  romance  centred  about  the  Great  Lakes, 
from  the  time  of  their  discovery  and  early  exploration  by  the  French 
missionaries  down  to  the  present  time  when  they  play  so  important  a 
part  in  the  industrial  progress  of  the  Middle  West.  This  book  tells 
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those  picturesque  aspects  of  history  which  interest  the  general  reader. 
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A  Tale  of  the  Cherokees  and  the  Pioneers  of  Tennessee,  1760,  by  the 
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with  romances  of  marvellous  and  beautiful  countries  beyond  the 
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